The Other Woman Read Free Page A

suspicious.
    â€˜Mm,’ said Lloyd. ‘I saw the catalogue.’
    â€˜Sorry, sir,’ said Finch. ‘I didn’t think anyone would mind me bringing it in.’
    â€˜My,’ said Lloyd. He didn’t mind what he brought in, even if it was a Christmas catalogue in October. He minded the language being misused.
    â€˜Sorry?’
    â€˜ My bringing it in, Finch.’
    The young man frowned. ‘You, sir?’ he said, then coloured. ‘Oh – I didn’t realise. I’ll take mine away.’
    Lloyd unnecessarily smoothed down what was left of his dark, short hair, a gesture that those who knew him recognised only too well. ‘No,’ he said, with dangerously exaggerated patience, ‘I was—’ He broke off. ‘Forget it,’ he said wearily. ‘ In fact – let me see the catalogue some time – I’ll buy something from it. I’m very interested in endangered species.’
    Finch looked puzzled. ‘ But if you’ve already got a catalogue—’
    Lloyd jumped to his feet and leant over the desk. ‘ I don’t have a catalogue, Finch !’ he shouted, making the sergeant jump. ‘All right?’
    â€˜Sir.’
    Lloyd sat down again. ‘Endangered species,’ he said, his tone well-modulated once more. ‘ There’s a little creature that I’m very fond of. Tiny little thing. It’s tail’s longer than its body.’
    Finch looked a touch desperate. ‘To be honest, sir, I don’t know too much about animals. I just …’ He cleared his throat. ‘ I just think we should hang on to the ones we’ve got, that’s all. Some sort of monkey, is it?’
    Lloyd shook his head. ‘It performs two distinct and very useful functions,’ he said. ‘And yet it’s dying out.’
    Finch nodded. ‘Habitat being destroyed?’ he suggested, hopefully.
    â€˜Oh, yes.’ Lloyd stood up again, and walked over to the table on which he had piled baskets of files and street-maps and his in-tray, on the grounds that that way his desk looked tidier. He perched on the only available corner, and regarded Finch. ‘Yes,’ he said again. ‘Its habitat’s being destroyed all right. Being eroded further and further every day – every minute of every day.’
    The sergeant looked round, as though he thought someone might rescue him.
    â€˜But that’s not the worst of it,’ continued Lloyd. ‘ Some well-meaning but ill-informed people pick them up and put them where they don’t belong at all.’
    â€˜In zoos,’ Finch volunteered.
    Lloyd beamed. ‘ Yes,’ he agreed, enthusiastically. ‘In zoos – very often in zoos. And …’ He leant over to his desk, and picked up the open file on the rapes, two in Malworth and one in Stansfield, on which Finch had prepared a report for the incident room which had been set up in Malworth. He reached into his inside pocket for the glasses that he had discovered, much to his chagrin, that he needed for small print. He didn’t need them for Finch’s large, clear hand, but he had been given a new prop, and that had taken a lot of the sting out of losing his twenty-twenty vision. He took them out of their pouch, cleaning them carefully before putting them on and glancing at the report.
    â€˜In zoos,’ he repeated, with a sad shake of the head. He took off his glasses again and looked at Finch. ‘And cafés.’
    Finch stared at him. ‘Cafés, sir?’ he repeated, his voice incredulous.
    Lloyd’s eyes widened. ‘I don’t know why you look so astonished,’ he said. ‘You’re the one who puts them there.’
    Finch’s eyes held something very like alarm.
    â€˜I am very well aware, Finch,’ said Lloyd, ‘that you would infinitely prefer to be facing a crazed gunman, but this is part of your job too.’ Lloyd was