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He’d done something unusual. He’d bought a real newspaper; one of the mainstream daily tabloids and now sat on a bench, on the promenade at Crosby beach, reading it, overlooking the Iron Men, or what was left of them.
Anca, the translator of several books on dog pedigrees, had made friends with a woman who was walking her pets and they were now on the sands, throwing things which caused the animals to charge up and down, retrieving them, dutifully bringing them back then lying excitedly at the feet of whoever they’d chosen as the lucky recipient.
What Nicks read confused him. It wasn’t the actual news. It was the lack of content, the lack of detail. After reading a headline, he discovered that perusal of the article itself was a pastime for those who needed or wanted to waste some time; a bit like watching cricket as far as he was concerned. It seemed if one followed Twitter or had the ability to cut and paste formatted descriptions, usually declaring someone a dangerous extremist, without providing a shred of real evidence, you were two-thirds of the way to being a seasoned journalist.
He did note, however, from the reported convictions, that none of the dangerous extremists actually had any ‘form’ for dangerous extremism. Maybe the Police weren’t reading the right papers.
One article denigrated local councils for making too much money from parking fines, yet alongside, another complained the police were not fining enough people for leaving their engines running in order to defrost their windscreens. Below this was yet another that carried the intention of one constabulary to use the very same legislation to target those victims who’d had their vehicles stolen after making the same mistake.
‘It’s the way forward’ he thought. ‘Improve the police detection rate by arresting the victims for complicity when they strolled into a local nick to report the crime, if they could find one open.’
A little smile wandered across his lips as he thought of Thurstan. The poor old DCI couldn’t even use that tactic to improve his personal detection rate. All his complainants were already dead and arresting dead people was frowned upon, even by the Police.
He sighed, got up, folded the paper, pushing it into the nearby bin before descending the steps to the beach. It wasn’t his normal thing but he was going to join Anca and her friend throwing rubber balls. It made more sense.
The dogs exhausted, he and Anca strolled along the sand stopping now and then to admire the view; the massive container ship leaving to navigate the Irish Sea and the stoic Iron Men, ever ready – for something.
“Why do you insist on doing this?” she asked, gazing into the puddle left by the tide
“You wanted to see the beach.”
She scowled at him. “You know what I mean. Why have you made this thing a crusade?”
“He was a friend. I liked him. He reminded me of a form teacher I once had.”
She looked up at him. “Why can’t you leave it to the police?”
“I owe it to him. Besides, they’re struggling. They’ll need a few lucky breaks and I’m not prepared to chance it.” He put his hands on her shoulders. “I’m sorry. You know I can’t just walk away.” Their eyes were fixed on each other. “We can buy another house, on another hill.”
Her eyes began to fill up. “I don’t want another house or another hill. I want our house, on our hill. It’s our home and I won’t run away.”
He pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her. She began to cry, he could feel her fighting him and the emotion.
“I love you, Nicks. You’re my life. I can’t live without you. I refuse to.” She suddenly pulled away and punched him in the chest.
“Ow! That hurt!”
“And so it should! You’re an idiot Nicks, you and your silly code of honour.”
He was still rubbing his ribs. “It’ll be over soon, I promise.”
She punched his arm. “It had better be!”
“Ow! Mind the shooting arm!”
She laughed at him. “C’mon you wimp! I’ll race you to the steps!” She was off. He knew he’d struggle to catch her but he’d do anything for love.