Читать книгу The Women's Club - Abusive partners are winding up dead… Criminals who target women are the victims of nasty accidents… Pretend it's not happening, you might live longer - Michael Crawley - Страница 14

Detective Lieutenant Anne Smelding made a final adjustment to the angle of her uniform cap and then stood at parade-ground attention. Chief Garson Leyman was going to keep her waiting outside his office, where everyone could see her being humiliated, for as long as he possibly could. She knew that. He wanted her to be quivering with frustration by the time her interview started. From his point of view, ideally, she’d break down in tears even before he called her in. That’d prove her unsuitability for promotion.

He didn’t know her very well, did he! She’d stand there until she turned into a pillar of salt, like Lot’s wife, if that’s what it was going to take. Anne flexed her calf muscles every few minutes, an old trick she’d learned from her dear departed father, who was ex-military. It kept the circulation going, but no one could see the movement because she was wearing pants.

The appointed time came and passed. Sergeant Pho, who hated her, breezed past her into Leyman’s office and breezed out again twenty minutes later. Pho, a mere sergeant, had easy access to the chief, whereas she, a lieutenant with considerable seniority, but a woman, didn’t.

It was four minutes short of an hour after the appointed time when she was finally allowed to enter the inner sanctum. Chief Leyman didn’t invite her to sit. He didn’t even look up from the file he was pretending to read. Anne thought about coughing for his attention but decided against it.

He laid the file aside and pulled another, one that had her name on the cover, to front and centre. His eyes lifted to hers. ‘Yes?’

‘You should have the results from my captaincy exam by now, sir.’

‘I do.’

‘May I know how I did?’

‘You passed.’

‘My marks, sir?’

‘As I said, you passed.’

Anne made tight fists behind her back. ‘Barely, sir, or a bit better than that?’

‘Better.’ He pushed the file away as if exasperated. ‘You got high marks, Smelding. Does that satisfy you?’

‘Thank you, sir. In that case, my application for promotion?’

‘Smelding – Anne – you have an excellent record. You’re bright and dedicated. Some day, you’ll make a fine captain.’

‘Thank you, sir, but why “some day”? Why not today? With my record and seniority, I should have made captain years ago.’

‘You’re in Homicide, Anne. We can’t very well have a woman captain in Homicide.’

‘Pardon me, but why not, sir?’

‘The pressure – from above. The press. The politics. It wouldn’t be fair on you. Now, in another division – Vice, for example? You’d do very well in Vice. Would you consider a transfer?’

‘Are you saying that women officers are more suited to Vice than to Homicide, sir?’

‘Exactly.’

‘And that’s your final word?

‘Think about it, Anne. I’d give you a strong recommendation. You can rely on me for that.’

Anne managed to unlock her jaw enough to get out, ‘Thank you, sir,’ before she marched from Chief Leyman’s office.

She made it to the washroom before a single tear slid down her cheek. But once she was inside the only safe place in the whole boys’ club that masqueraded as a precinct the waterworks flowed. Much to her dismay, there were two other policewomen chatting as they washed up.

Anne splashed her face with cold water, hoping to hide her weakness. It wouldn’t do to have anyone, not even other women, see her bawling like a little girl. She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up from the basin. In the mirror, she saw a sympathetic female face.

‘Let me guess,’ said Lieutenant Shirley Mathers. ‘Chief Leyman?’

Anne nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

The other policewoman, a sergeant who Anne didn’t recognise, said, ‘He’s such an asshole.’

Anne had to laugh. She took the paper towel Shirley offered and dried her face.

Shirley said, ‘Like you, I should’ve made captain years ago,’ she said. ‘And the worst of it is, you know, he says the most blatantly sexist stuff, but if I ever reported it…’

‘You’d be the one who looked bad.’

The other cop nodded. ‘I hate him.’

‘Don’t we all,’ said Shirley.

The sergeant added, ‘We’d all like to see him cut down to size but none of us does anything about it, do we?’

Anne shrugged. ‘There’s not much we can do about it, is there?’

Shirley flipped the top two buttons of her shirt open. ‘By what I see on TV, showing off her boobs is the best way for a lady cop to get promoted.’

The sergeant said, ‘Nah – that only works for crime scene investigators. If I thought that showing off my boobs would get me a promotion, I’d be coming in topless.’

‘And wouldn’t they just love that,’ Anne said.