Читать книгу The Follow - Paul Grzegorzek - Страница 15

My situation hadn’t improved by the next day, and I was still followed everywhere I went. That morning I had taken my gaggle of followers on a walk over the downs and returned home feeling marginally better than I had since I’d been arrested. I parked up just around the corner from the house and was more than a little surprised to see a uniformed police officer standing on my front step as I trudged up the road.

I didn’t recognize him but, as he looked about twelve, I assumed that he was from the tutor unit. He looked at me with worry written all over his face as I approached and came up the steps towards him. He put out a hand that hovered hesitantly in front of my chest.

‘Uh, I’m sorry, sir, you can’t come in. This is a crime scene.’

I looked at him in amazement. ‘Crime scene? This is my bloody house!’

His cherubic face took on a look of anger as I swore. ‘Sir, I’m warning you under Section Five of the Public Order Act, if you swear again I will be forced to arrest you!’

I looked around ostentatiously. ‘Do you see anyone here who is likely to be harassed, alarmed or distressed by my swearing?’ I asked, seeing the doubt blossom on his face as I quoted the act right back at him. ‘I don’t – and, as you can’t be the one to feel any of that, I suggest you stop being a pillock and get someone who knows their job.’

I wasn’t making a friend here, I knew, but I wasn’t going to stand around and be dictated to by a kid who hadn’t even handcuffed someone on his own yet. We were saved by an officer I knew sticking his head out of the door, presumably to see what the commotion was about. Andy Coucher is a top-rate officer and, about a year before, had moved on to the tutor unit to pass on some of his hard-gained street knowledge.