Minette Walters - Acid Row

Acid Row by Minette WAlters By the same author The Ice House The Sculptress The Scold's Bridle The Dark Room The Echo The Breaker The Shape of Snakes MINETTE WALTERS Acid Row MACMILLAN First published 2001 by Macmillan an imprint of Pan Macmillan Ltd Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Road, London Nl 9RR Basingstoke and Oxford Associated companies throughout the world www.panmacmillan.com ISBN 0 333 90748 5 (Hardback) ICDH 0 333 90719 3 (Tradu Papsrbaclr,),. Copyright Minette Walters 2001 The right of Minette Walters to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Typeset by Set Systems Ltd, Saffron Walden, Essex Printed and bound in Great Britain by Mackays of Chatham plc, Chatham, Kent For Sheonagh and Pat THE RIOT LOST momentum as news of the butchery spread through the estate. The details were vague. No one knew how many had been killed or how, but castration, lynching and a machete attack were all mentioned. The streets began to empty rapidly. Collective guilt was felt, if not openly expressed, and no one was inclined to face retribution for murder. The youths on the barricades who had held the police at bay with petrol bombs took a similar view.

They would argue afterwards, and with some justification, that they hadn't known what was going on, but when word of the frenzied attack filtered through they, too, melted away. It was one thing to fight an honourable battle with the enemy, quite another to be accused of aiding and abetting insanity in Humbert Street. The headlines the next morning 29 July were lurid. "Drink-crazed lynch mob goes on the rampage1 ... "Sex pervert butchered? ... 5 hours of savagery leaves 3 dead, 189 injured' ...

The outside world gave a shudder of disgust. Leader-writers lined up the usual suspects. Government. Police. Social workers. Education chiefs.

Across the country, morale in the vocational services reached an all-time low. But of the two thousand rioters who jostled for a view of the killing spree, not one would ever admit to being there ... From the Director of Social Services Tuesday 10 July 2001 Official Notification to Health & Social Workers Highly Confidential Not for public release Rehousing: Milosz Zelowski, 23 Humbert Street, Bassindale-previously of Callum Road, Portisf ield. Reason for move: Targeted by Portisfield residents after publication of photograph in local newspaper. Status: Registered paedophile. Convicted of sexual assault 3 counts over 15-year period.

Released May 2001. Threat to the community: Minimal. Nature of offence suggests watching brief only. Threat to offender: Severe. Police warn that Zelowski may become the target of vigilantes if his identity and status become known. 19-20 July 2001 ONLY A HANDFUL of staff at the Nightingale Health Centre ever read the memo referring to the presence of a paedophile on the Bassindale Estate. 19-20 July 2001 ONLY A HANDFUL of staff at the Nightingale Health Centre ever read the memo referring to the presence of a paedophile on the Bassindale Estate.

It vanished under a pile of paperwork in the central office and ended up being filed by one of the clerical workers, who assumed it had done the rounds. For those who did see it, it was an unremarkable document, recording the name and details of a new patient. For the rest, it was irrelevant since it wouldn't or shouldn't affect the way they treated the man. One of the health visitors tried to have the issue raised at a staff meeting, but she was overruled by her supervisor, who had responsibility for setting the agenda. There was a history of hostility between the two women neither believing the other was up to her job which may have prejudiced the way the supervisor handled the matter. It was the summer and everyone wanted to be home in reasonable time.

In any case, even if the doctors agreed that it was dangerous and irresponsible to house a paedophile on an estate full of children, there was nothing they could do about it. The decision to move him had been taken by the police. The same health visitor approached Dr. Sophie Morrison in a blatant attempt to have the supervisor's decision overturned. By that time she was less interested in the paedophile than in scoring points, and Sophie Morrison, being naive and inexperienced in office politics, was easily intimidated. Such, at least, was Fay Baldwin's interpretation of the cheerful young woman who had joined the surgery two years before.

Fay waited until the end of evening surgery, then gave her signature tap on Sophie's door a rat-a-tat-tat of brittle nails that produced identical reactions in all her colleagues. "Time for a chat?" she asked brightly, poking her head into the room. "Fraid not," said Sophie, launching herself manic ally at her keyboard and typing "the quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" repetitively into her monitor. "Catching up on some notes ... and then home. Sorry, Fay.

How about tomorrow?" It didn't work. It never did. The dreadful woman eased herself inside anyway and perched her scraggy bottom on the edge of the desk. It was encased, as usual, in an impeccably tailored skirt; and, as usual, there wasn't a dyed hair out of place. Both were outward and visible signs that she considered herself a model of efficiency and professionalism, but they were in inverse proportion to what was going on inside her head. It was Catch-22.

She was desperate to cling to the only thing that gave her life meaning her job. Yet her hatred for the people she dealt with patients and professionals alike had reached disastrous proportions. Sophie had argued that the kindest course would be to retire her early and set her up with psychiatric help in order to cope with the emptiness of her life. The senior partner a great deal less sympathetic towards elderly, frustrated virgins whose only talent was for stirring preferred to let sleeping dogs lie. It was less than three months before they'd be shot of her for good, was his view. "I couldn't possibly take my clothes off in front of people I know," she'd said. "I couldn't possibly take my clothes off in front of people I know," she'd said.

As if anyone cared. "I'll only be a minute," trilled Fay now in her little-girly voice. "You can spare me sixty seconds, can't you, Sophie?" "As long as you don't mind my packing up at the same time," said the doctor with an inward sigh. She shut down her computer and slid her chair backwards, wondering which of her patients had just had typing exercises added to their notes. It was always the same with Fay. "I'm meeting Bob at eight." "Is it true you're getting married?" "Yes," said Sophie, happy to be on safe ground. "I finally got him up to the mark." "I wouldn't marry a reluctant man." "It was a joke, Fay." Her smile faded before the other woman's downturned mouth. "Ah, well, it's hardly earth-shattering news." She pulled her waist-length plait from behind her shoulder and started to comb it out with her fingers, quite unconsciously drawing attention to her unaffected youthfulness. "It was Melanie Patterson who told me," remarked Fay spitefully. "I would have mentioned it last week but she said it was supposed to be a secret." Damn! Damn! Damn! "I didn't want to tempt fate in case Bob changed his mind," said Sophie, concentrating on her plait. "I would have mentioned it last week but she said it was supposed to be a secret." Damn! Damn! Damn! "I didn't want to tempt fate in case Bob changed his mind," said Sophie, concentrating on her plait.