Eeny Meeny

69

Helen stood in front of Whittaker’s desk like an errant schoolgirl. She knew why she’d been summoned. He knew she knew. But still he took his time, leafing through page after page of the Evening News, before folding it up and placing it carefully on the table, the front page facing up.

‘CLUELESS!’

The headline screamed out at her. She had read Emilia Garanita’s article first thing this morning and knew immediately that it would cause ripples up and down the chain. It had a few salient details about Amy and Sam, and Ben and Peter, and a couple of sketchy pointers on Martina. But it led on the release of Mickery and the suspension of ‘a senior officer working on the current investigation’. It looked bad. Helen guessed that Whittaker had already had his ear badly bent by his superiors, such was the look of thunder he’d given her when she entered.

‘I’ll call her,’ Helen found herself saying. ‘See if I can get her to call off the dogs.’

‘Bit late for that, isn’t it? Besides, there’s no need. I’ve called her myself. She’ll be here in five minutes.’

Emilia entered the room, looking like the cat that had got the cream. She took her time deciding between tea and coffee, indulging in small talk and so on. She had been summoned, anointed, and she was clearly going to enjoy herself.

‘Do you have anything to add, Detective Superintendent? Do you still have faith in Inspector Grace’s leadership of the investigation? Have there been any developments?’

‘I’m not here to talk about the case. I’m here to talk about you,’ Whittaker fired back brusquely.

‘I don’t follow -’

‘It’s time you backed off this one. Your interventions are misleading and unhelpful and I want them to stop. No more articles until there is something genuine to report. Get me?’

Helen was amused by the boldness of his approach – no one stood between Whittaker and promotion.

‘I do hope you are not trying to dictate to the press -’

‘That’s precisely what I’m fucking doing. And if I were you I’d heed what I’m saying to you.’

Emilia was stumped for once, but she rallied quickly.

‘With the greatest of respect -’

‘What do you know about respect?’ Whittaker barked over her. ‘What respect have you shown the Anderson family during their ordeal? Shouting through their letterbox, calling their home night and day, sitting outside their house hour after hour, going through their bins.’

‘You’re exaggerating. I have a duty -’

‘Am I? I have a log here detailing every time your red Fiat registration number BD50 JKR has parked up outside their house. The log was compiled by Amy’s father and runs to two pages. It places you there at midnight, 2 a.m., 3 a.m. It goes on and on and on. It’s harassment. It’s stalking. Need I remind you of the Leveson enquiry? And the code of conduct that all journalists, whether national or regional’ – he said this last word with real disdain – ‘have agreed to abide by?’

For once Emilia had no comeback. So Whittaker continued:

‘I could demand a front-page apology to the family. I could have you fined. Fuck it, I could probably get you sacked if I really wanted to. But I’m a kind man so I’m going to be merciful. But keep your ill-informed opinions to yourself or you’ll find yourself hounded out of local journalism and, hell, there’s no way back from that, is there?’

Emilia left shortly afterwards, fuming but helpless. Helen was speechless – and impressed.

‘Do you really have a log of her visits?’ she asked.

‘Of course not’ was the reply. ‘Now get back to work and please, Helen, make some bloody progress. I’ve bought you some time. Make use of it.’

And with that she was dismissed. Helen marvelled at his front and was impressed by his loyalty to the team – and to her. But as she headed back down the corridor, she couldn’t help feeling that this outright attack on the grimly determined journalist would rebound on them. Emilia had survived much worse than this and always came back fighting.