Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 98, No. 4 & 5. Whole No. 588 & 589, October 1991

Because You’re a Cop by Peter Turnbull

Peter Turnbull, who has been a steelworker and a crematorium assistant and is currently employed as a social worker, lives in Glasgow, Scotland. His novels include The Claws of the Gryphon, Two Way Cut, Condition Purple, and his sixth and most recent mystery, And Did Murder Him (St. Martin’s Press), about the Glasgow Police P Division’s investigation into the violent death of a young heroin addict...

It started as a code 10 — just an ordinary, twenty-a-day code 10. It was in itself a small incident, hardly reported in the newspaper. Not the big dailies, not even the local evening paper afforded the story room. It did, however, make the Bearsden and Milngavie Gazette, “delivered free to your house and supported entirely by advertising revenue.” As a few inches of inside-column — filler — it read:

Which was about all that needed to be said...

A man in his middle years is walking down a central city street at the quiet time, that time between the smog and crush of the homeward rush hour and the onset of the press of the young and fashionable, click-clicking or swaying with newly discovered masculinity from trendy pub to late-drinking nightspot. A quiet time — a time when a motorist can cross the grid system without stopping, a time when overtime workers stroll home, a time when the occasional man with a problem, either at home or at work, stops on his way from one to the other for a drink — which more often than not becomes two, then three. It’s a time, being high summer, when the swallows and the swifts who during the day had darted and hunted close to the ground now dart and hunt two hundred feet above the rooftops, where the flying insects have been pushed by the day’s thermal uplift from the baking city.

And on that Tuesday, the swallows and swifts darted and hunted against a background of blue going crimson in the north — this in the eyes of the homeward-strolling overtime worker.

It was not at all the time that a man expects to be mugged.

Richard King had drawn the backshift that week, starting at 5:00 P.M. and finishing he never knew when, but very usually well into the graveyard shift’s time, which starts at 1:00 A.M. That particular Tuesday, backshift was quiet. Very quiet. Ray Sussock had nothing at all to hand over to him and went home beaming with satisfaction because he had opened and shut a murder file all within the day shift. It was, though, not so difficult, because the man had shuffled up to the uniform bar, laid a bloody kitchen knife on the polished pinewood surface, and said, blinking with humility, “Excuse me, sir, but I just done me wife in.”

“I see, sir,” had said the uniform-bar officer. “Will you please come and sit through here? The sergeant will want to have a word with you. No, sir, you can leave that with me.”

A call to the address given by the man had indeed revealed a very bloody corpse on the living-room floor. Sussock had finished the charging and the report in time to finish at 5:00 P.M., leaving King with nothing to do.

He did the Daily Herald crossword puzzle and then sat with his feet on the desk and watched the sun burn in a scarlet ball and settle on the hills to the northwest, somewhere over Loch Lomond. He picked up the Daily Herald again and reread it. He thought about his beautiful Quakeress wife Rosemary and their son Iain. He thought of how Rosemary always wore her hair in a bun, how she always wore either skirts or dresses, and how she never wore makeup and never complained.

He thought of how she had asked for shelves, of how he had brought the wood home with which to build her the shelves the previous November, of how he had propped them up in the kitchen, to turn his attention to Iain, and of how there they had remained from that day to this. He thought of how Iain had begun to walk and to gurgle with happiness—

The phone rang.

“D.C. King.” He reached for his notepad and pen as he spoke.

“Code 10, sir,” said the silk-smooth voice of the switchboard operator. “G.R.I. Tango Delta Foxtrot requests C.I.D. attendance.”

“On my way,” said Richard King.

“Two or three footsteps.”

“Two or three footsteps,” Richard King echoed the man’s words before he knew what he was saying. He said it out of a sense of despair. “Two or three footsteps is not a lot for us to go on, Mr. Ryan.”

“I’m not going to fabricate information for you, sir.” George Ryan held a paper towel to his nose, although the bleeding had long since stopped.

“Of course. But still, Mr. Ryan, we need more to go on than that. How many of them were there?”

“Two.”

“Young? Old? Men? Women?”

“You have female muggers?”

“You’d better believe it.”

“My, my.”

Ryan dabbed his nose and winced as he dabbed a little too hard. He was a small man, bald and neatly dressed, but in a manner that suggested he was making ends meet. A wedding band worn proudly spoke of a lady keeping the hearth at home.

“How many?” King pressed. He was dressed in cream-colored slacks and a casual jacket, and wore a tie, despite the heat. Regulations.

“Two,” said George Ryan. He had a soft voice, with a certain musical lilt to it. From the islands, King thought, certainly not a native Glaswegian.

“Men?”

“Aye.”

“You didn’t see them?”

“Not clearly. I say—”

A nurse came into the cubicle, mumbled an apology as she knelt at a cupboard and took out a packet of gauze, and retreated again, swishing the curtain shut behind her.

“You say—?”

“Oh, aye. I say it was clear enough that they were two men as opposed to two lassies.”

“Young?”

“Aye.”

“Twenties?”

“Aye — och, aye. They wore those things — jeans.” King began to take notes.

“Just ran up behind me, knocked me on the head, kicked me in the face. The doctor said I have a broken nose. They went into my jacket, got my wallet, and were away. I punched one and scratched the other. I drew blood.” Ryan held up his hands. “I have strong nails, strong on calcium. I play the guitar.”

“The guitar?”

“Aye, it’s a lovely instrument. I don’t play this bong, bang, yeah yeah rubbish, but the classical guitar. See my nails — protruding on the right hand, cut back on the left?”

King nodded. “So you drew blood?”

“Aye. The guy swore and kicked me. Some of the blood on my shirt is his, his face rubbed against it — I pulled him with my left hand and clawed him deeply with my right.”

“Good man.”

“Aye, there’s life in the old dog yet.” Ryan smiled and his eyes glowed warmly.

King grinned. “It would help us if we could keep your shirt, sir. We could get blood samples from it. And we’d like to take swabs from under your fingernails.”

“To get the attacker’s blood group?”

“Yes, and rather more than that. In fact, in these days of advanced medical science, we can identify a person from his blood, or a flake of his skin, or a piece of hair, or a sample of body fluids.”

“My heavens.” Ryan dabbed his nose.

“It’s a process called genetic fingerprinting.”

“Genetic fingerprinting.”

“That’s it. Practically foolproof. A microscopic sample of body tissue or fluid is sufficient to identify an individual. The print itself looks like a series of dots and dashes. A bit like a line of Morse code. The chances of two people having the same print — the same order and spacing of dots and dashes — is about one in ten million.”

“Ten million to one.”

“And that’s a conservative estimate. The problem is that the process is expensive, and that’s a major consideration in these days of police forces being told to sell their horses to the French to slaughter for meat so as to save pennies. It’s really only used in complex murder cases.”

“Which this isn’t.”

“Which it isn’t. But we’ll take samples, anyway. You see, these felons sound like they’ve done this before. We might want them for heaven knows what. So if you’re fit, sir, we’ll go to the police station.”

“Sounds worrying.”

“Not if you’re one of the good guys,” King smiled.

He took Ryan to P Division Police Station at Charing Cross. As he drove across the city, darkness was falling. The young and trendy were walking soberly. In a few hours’ time, they would be reveling, would have spent money. Many would be drunk. Some would go home in the accompaniment of a strange new body to discover. Some would be taken to hospital, some would be taken to the cells. Glasgow town at night.

In a room in the police station, George Ryan sat at a table and waited. The room was bare and functional and confirmed his idea of what a room in a police station might look like. There was a modern steel table, a chair at each side, a third chair in the corner, a light in the ceiling, a Police Mutual calendar on the wall, a metal filing cabinet in the corner.

Ryan was still in shock, but he felt himself to be coming out of it. He knew his name, he knew his age, he knew where he was and above all he knew what he wanted: he wanted to go home.

The door opened and a man bumbled into the room. Ryan thought that “bumble” was the only word he knew to describe the man. He was big-bodied, small-limbed. He wore spectacles with immensely thick lenses that didn’t seem at all in place perched on his fat, flabby-cheeked face — balanced by hair cut so short it resembled a black cap perched on the back of the man’s head.

The man moved awkwardly, turning a full circle in the process of closing the door, and scraped the second chair on the floor as he pulled it toward him from beneath the table. He did not, to Ryan, seem to be a man who was happy with his body. “Mr. Ryan?” He spoke nervously, hesitatingly. He carried a plastic case.

“Yes.”

“My name is Bothwell. Forensic Chemist. I’ve been asked to scrape under your nails.”

“Yes,” said Ryan. “The officer—”

But Bothwell moved as if disinterested in Ryan’s reply. He was a man doing a job he was paid to do, and he did it mechanically and perfunctorily. Ryan wasted no more effort speaking to the bumbling chemist but laid his right hand on the table. Bothwell fumbled and bumbled, opening the case laboriously, freeing one clasp and then the other. He pressed back the lid and took out a shiny red spatula and self-sealing cellophane sachet. He dug deeply under Ryan’s nails, ignoring his gasps of discomfort, and scraped the excavated material into the sachet.

“Other hand, please,” he said distantly and dismissively. So much so that Ryan wondered if the chemist had difficulty in distinguishing between victim and perpetrator. Ryan placed his left hand on the table.

“I play the guitar,” he said by means of explanation. Bothwell grunted and replaced the spatula in the case. He took an inkpad and a sheet of paper marked with two sets of five squares.

“Fingerprints,” smiled Ryan.

“That’s it,” said Bothwell. “If we find your property, we have to know which are your prints and which are the villains’. Simple as that.”

Bothwell eventually thanked Ryan for his cooperation and left the room, leaving Ryan once again alone, this time occupying the time by rubbing the ink from his fingertips.

King drove Ryan home. He found that Ryan and his lady lived above the shop. Literally.

Ryan asked King to stop beside a row of small shops. “That’s mine,” he said proudly, pointing to Ryan’s Newsagents under a bright sign, white on red, above the window. It stood between the chemist and the baker’s and two down from the sub postoffice. “It’s best to park here — we’ll walk round the back.”

“Round the back” was a yard, clean-swept as King would have expected, this being Bearsden — a line of dustbins partially hidden from view by a neat brick wall. A flight of stairs led up to a gallery and the front doors of the flats above the shops.

Ryan sprinted up the stairs — agile for his years, observed King, and a man glad to be home. He walked along the gallery with King in his wake and stopped at a lilac-colored door. He slipped a key into the lock and turned it. “Some owners live above the shop like we do,” he said as the door swung open. “Others let the flats out.”

The flat was in darkness, yet a female voice cried, “George?” The voice had a ring of relief. “George — is that you?”

Ryan switched on the light. “Yes, it’s me, dear.” King stepped over the threshold, and as he did his nostrils were assaulted by the smell of smoke and fire damage. Ryan walked down a narrow corridor and into a living room, King following. Ryan switched on the light in the room. A woman stood in the center of the room. King saw that she was younger than Ryan, perhaps by about fifteen years. She was neatly dressed in blue. A dog, a golden labrador, sat at her feet. King was amused by the dog’s reaction — pleased at Ryan’s return, curious about King.

Ryan and the woman hugged each other. “I’ve been so worried,” said the woman.

“I’ve been in a bit of bother.” Ryan guided the woman to the chair, rotated her, and sat her down. “I’ve brought someone home.”

“Is that blood I smell?” There was a note of alarm in the woman’s voice.

“It’s not my blood,” Ryan reassured her. “Don’t be alarmed. Like I said, I’ve brought a gentleman home with me.”

“Oh.” The woman started to stand, but Ryan rested a hand on her shoulder and she extended her hand from a sitting position. King walked forward and shook it. Then he saw the woman hadn’t the posture and the solely functional dress sense of one who has been born blind, but that she held herself well and took pride in her appearance. She was dressed in matching clothes — light-blue sweater, blue slacks, blue shoes. She had lost her sight.

King shook her hand warmly. “Hello.” He gave as much as he could with his voice. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Ryan.”

“As you see and probably smell, we had a bit of a fire.” Ryan extended his hand, inviting King to look around him.

King did as he was invited. The walls were blackened with smoke, as was the ceiling, and at present the Ryans’ furniture consisted of a camping table and two folding chairs.

“It happened two or three days ago,” said George Ryan. “Everything went up in smoke. I grabbed Jean and Susie and got them downstairs. They’re the most important. I had time to get back and get the guitars.”

“You were foolish,” said his wife with a smile. “He was foolish, sir.”

“Call me Richard,” said King.

“He was foolish, Richard. The guitars could have been replaced.”

“Not easily,” said George Ryan. “They blend so well. And it will be months before the insurance company pays out.”

“Anyway, I’m proud of you — you’re so courageous.”

“I was in no danger,” Ryan assured her. “Some tea, Richard?”

King glanced at his watch. “Well, yes — thanks. That would be nice.”

Ryan went to the kitchen, peeling his bloodied shirt off.

“Take a seat, Richard.” Mrs. Ryan beckoned to the vacant chair.

King sat, the brightly striped Terylene creaking as he lowered himself between the narrow confines of the chair arms.

“It’s make do and mend for us until the insurance company pays out. We have no savings. Is my husband badly hurt? He wouldn’t tell me even if he is, and of course I can’t tell easily.”

“No.” King allowed a strongly reassuring note into his voice. “No, he isn’t. He got jumped, he fought back, and it’s the other person’s blood you smelled just now. Mr. Ryan’s been to the hospital. His nose is broken and it will be sore for a week, but he needs no treatment and they don’t want to see him again.”

“Thank you. I feel better.”

“I’m afraid they got his wallet.”

Jean Ryan smiled. “There won’t have been much in it.”

“Mr. Ryan is a newsagent?”

“Yes. We’re not long in the business. We’ve been married for only about four years.”

“Only?” said King. “Four years is a long time. If you’ve done the first four, you’ll do the rest.”

In the kitchen, cups rattled and a kettle whistled.

“Well, George is forty-nine, I’m thirty-five. Four years is a long time for people of our years. George gave me the will to live again. My first husband died in a car crash.”

“I’m sorry.”

“His heart attacked him while he was driving. He died instantly. I was in the car, in the front passenger seat. I lost my sight as a result of head injuries. I still have terrible headaches from time to time. My skull often feels like a walnut being splintered open, but I suffer it in silence. George has been so good. He’s just all that is the milk of human kindness.” She smiled. “We communicate through music. We talk, of course, but as lovers we’re not able to gaze into each other’s eyes, and so we play the guitar together instead. They’re German-made. We ordered them specially. They’re our luxury. We touch each other’s souls that way. It might sound a bit soft, but it’s important to us.”

“It doesn’t sound soft at all.”

“Are you married, Richard?”

“Yes,” and he told her about Rosemary and about Iain.

George Ryan entered the room with a tray of tea and biscuits and settled on the floor, refusing to accept King’s offer of the chair.

Later, he walked King back to where King had parked the police vehicle. “Jean put me right,” he said suddenly, without prompting.

“Sorry?” King carried Ryan’s bloodied shirt in a plastic bag.

“I was a bit wild. Not in the sense that young people are wild. Oh, I was that all right when I was young. But I was getting on middle-aged, still drinking too much — no direction in life, no achievements, still in rented rooms. I think if I had carried on, I may well have come to the unwelcome attention of you gentlemen, drunk and disorderly—”

“That’s something you don’t want,” King nodded.

It was dark. The evening was cool and still and calm — pleasant after the heat and bustle.

“Yes, I can imagine. But Jean gave me everything, sorted me out. I found that I have a deep-rooted need to care for somebody. That’s why I was going astray. I don’t just mean companionship, I mean a need to care for somebody and not in a patronizing way. Jean is as independent as she can be, and getting more so with each day that passes. But she has given meaning to my existence. Before I met her, I was a barfly. Now I’m a man.”

“I’m pleased for you.”

“We met in a supermarket.”

“Oh.”

“She was trying to identify items of food by touch. I went up to her, helped her, invited her for coffee, and we took it from there. We got married, and when the insurance money from the accident came through we bought the shop and started the newsagents.”

The two men reached the police vehicle. “We’ll be back in touch if we need to speak to you, Mr. Ryan,” said King. “Can’t promise to get your wallet back, though. I suspect you’ll have to write that off.”

King shrugged. “It was all but empty. I’ll cancel the credit card tomorrow. Safe home, Richard.”

The wallet was found the following afternoon by a woman digging her garden. She picked it up and opened it. It was empty, but the name and address of the owner were evident. She laid it to one side and continued to dig the garden. Later she returned to her house, washed, changed, and settled down to dinner. In the evening, in her own good time, she took the wallet to the police station. She was issued a receipt and she walked primly out the police station, her civic duty having been fulfilled. The wallet itself was placed in a self-sealing cellophane sachet and left for the attention of Elliot Bothwell, Forensic Chemist.

It was 14:40 hours on Thursday before Bothwell was able to address his attention to the wallet.

He laid it flat on his working surface and sprinkled it with iron filings, then gently brushed the filings away with a squirrel hairbrush. Latents appeared as would be expected on the inside and outside surfaces of the wallet.

He placed adhesive tape over the latents and then peeled the tape back, thus lifting the prints. He mounted the fingerprints on a card indicating the “open” case to which they were relevant and this he placed in an internal mailbag and labeled it for the attention of the Collator.

It was late on Thursday afternoon before the Collator fed computerized imprints of the latents lifted from the wallet into the computer. He pressed a button and heard the machine whir as it “hunted” and then left his desk to hustle a quick coffee and sandwich. He had had a hard day.

In a small flat above a newsagents shop, a couple, very much in love, sat down after the day’s work and played guitars together.

Fabian Donoghue drove from his modern bungalow on the outskirts of Edinburgh to his place of work in central Glasgow. The journey took an hour. It was a pleasant, effortless drive for high summer, with no holdups on the M8. He listened to Radio 4 as he drove. As always, it was news and commentary between 7:30 and 8:30. At 8:30 A.M., he parked his Rover in the rear of P Division and at 8:31 he was at his desk, filling his first pipe of the day.

Ray Sussock tapped at his door, holding an armful of files — anxious evidently, thought Donoghue, to hand over and get home. It was still a quiet period in the city, as happens, with not a great deal to hand over — just a spate of car thefts and burglaries and a few drunk and disorderlies.

“Calm before the storm, Ray,” said Donoghue, neatly dressed in a three-piece suit with a gold hunter’s chain looped across his chest. He was in his early forties.

“Indeed, sir.” Sussock stood unsteadily and wearily. He was almost fifteen years older than Donoghue and often, to Donoghue’s concerned eyes, looked tired. Very tired indeed.

Alone again in his office, Donoghue leaned back in his chair and read over the files on the ongoing cases Sussock had handed over before he signed out and returned home after a slow night shift.

There was a second, deferential tap on his door. Donoghue looked up. A young man, well dressed, stood on the threshold of his office.

“Jones, sir,” said the man. “Collator.” He held a file under his arm and Donoghue recognized it as a file of much-dated design. It awoke memories of his early days in the force, memories which were at the same time warm and embarrassing, days when he was in uniform and was finding his feet, days when older cops took him to one side and said, “Forget all that, this is how it’s done” — and days when the sergeant would take him to one side for an unofficial reprimand.

“Jones,” said Donoghue. “Of course.” He indicated the vacant chair in front of his desk. “I always seem to speak to you over the phone, never face to face. What can I do for you?”

Jones sat — a little nervously, thought Donoghue. Something was troubling the man.

“What was that that someone said about the past casting long shadows, sir?” Jones sat and opened the old file, and from behind his desk Donoghue cast his eye over old-fashioned forms and dated recording sheets.

“What have you dug up, Mr. Jones?”

“A murderer. In a word. Possibly.”

“Tell me!”

“Well, it’s in connection with the mugging on Tuesday, the one in the town—”

Donoghue made a gesture of exasperation. “You’ll have to remind me.”

“Gentleman got jumped by two neds, took his wallet. Richard King is the interested officer.”

“Oh, yes. A newsagent from Bearsden.”

“That’s the one, sir. His wallet was handed in. Empty, of course.”

“Of course.”

“Four sets of prints, sir. Two I have identified as belonging to two of our better customers, drug addicts with P.C.s for robbery with violence.”

“Good, that’s one case we can wrap up.”

“And maybe another, sir. The third print I lifted I ran through the machine — just procedure, takes hours. I went and had a break—”

“Yes, yes—”

“Well, when I came back there it was, blinking at me on the monitor screen.”

“What was blinking at you on the monitor screen?”

“A result.”

“A result?”

“The third print is the same — I mean, is identical to the print on the handle of a weapon, or rather the weapon used in the murder of Sadie Hall.”

“Who was Sadie Hall?”

Jones patted the dusty file and handed it to Donoghue. Donoghue took the file and tested its weight. “I’m short of time, Mr. Jones.” He handed the file back to Jones.

“To summarize, sir, it seems that Sadie Hall was a universally unpopular female — a ‘shrew’ is the word, I believe. Got under people’s skins. A difficult, impossible woman — she upset a lot of people.”

“I get the general idea. Not a nice lady.”

“So witness depositions state. Me, I was just ten years old at the time. It appears that her death didn’t cause great mourning and irreconcilable grief among Her Majesty’s lieges.”

“But it was murder?”

“Murder most foul, sir. Repeated stabbing. And there was vomit on the body. The pathologist’s report is in here somewhere. Oh, yes. The vomit was not that of the deceased’s, was the remnants of a fish supper and beer. That fact helped him pin down the time of death. Both the fish supper and the alcohol would have been consumed before 23:00 hours and the fish and chips were not digested, they were recognizable to the naked eye.”

“So what he’s saying is that it was an impulsive act, undertaken while under the influence of alcohol and possibly after considerable provocation. And that the murderer was literally sickened by his act.”

“That’s the inference, sir. The murder weapon was found at the locus and contained only one set of prints which were not previously known to us and which were only identified yesterday.”

“And that is the print which belongs to Mr. George Ryan, who was mugged on Tuesday night. The past casts long shadows indeed.”

“Yes, it’s Mr. Ryan’s print.”

“When did this murder take place?”

“Twenty years ago, sir.”

“Mr. Ryan would have been—”

“Twenty-nine, sir,” said Jones. “He’d have been twenty-nine years old. Sadie Hall was thirty-three.”

“Not just difficult, but set-in-her-ways difficult.”

“Appears so, sir.”

“It makes me feel sick, sir.” King closed the file.

“I’m not entirely happy about it, either, Richard.” Donoghue pulled on his pipe. “It’s why I’ve stayed on to talk to you about it.”

The clock on the wall ticked. It was 17:30 hours. The day was still hot, the sky was still blue, the sun was still a golden ball about to fall into Loch Lomond.

“The two neds who rolled George Ryan were bounced into the cells this afternoon. They coughed and they’ve been charged.”

“That’s the loose end tidied up, I suppose,” said King, “but the wider issue is still to be sorted out. Twenty years. I don’t suppose that—”

“No.” Donoghue flicked his lighter. “Don’t even think it, Richard. You see, there isn’t a wider issue. There’s no issue to be sorted out, no issue at all. Don’t compromise your career by even thinking that there’s an issue. George Ryan has to be arrested and charged with the murder of Sadie Hall.”

“I don’t want to be the arresting officer, sir.”

“I know you don’t. That’s why I’m ordering you to see it through.”

“Have you any idea what he’s done for that woman? His wife? He’s given life as much as he’s taken it. It’ll destroy her.”

“We don’t have the luxury of discretion, Richard. You know that as well as I do. It’s the benefit of having a separate prosecution service. It prevents the police from being personally vindictive and it removes the angst of discretion. The police south of the border have these problems. We don’t.”

“It’s going to be one of the hardest things I’ve done, sir.”

“Again, that’s why I want you to do it. You’re going to go far as a police officer, Richard. Part of going far is doing things that you don’t like doing. In fact, if you don’t do this, you won’t be going any farther.”

King shot a glance at Donoghue. Donoghue held his stare and raised his eyebrows.

“He might walk, Richard,” Donoghue said at length.

“Do you think it’s likely?”

“Odds on, I’d say.” Donoghue took his pipe from his mouth and teased the tobacco in the bowl with a ballpoint pen before lighting it again. “If he cops a plea of culpable homicide, if his lawyer can dig up enough people who remember Sadie Hall and he can put them in the witness box, each to do a character assassination, building up a picture of extreme provocation at the time of the incident, and if he can pull enough people to speak well of Mr. Ryan and his good character—” Donoghue waved his hand. “Well, your guess is as good as mine.”

“Five years,” suggested King. “Out in three?”

“At the very most. He could even walk with a meaningless probation order slapped on him. People have been given probation for murder before now. It might even be that the Procurator Fiscal will ‘no pro’ it. Corroborative evidence is a bit dodgy. Fingerprints on the murder weapon don’t add up to guilt, not in themselves, and if the policy to proceed only if a useful purpose is to be gained by prosecution is adhered to, then—”

Again Donoghue waved his hand. “But that’s his decision. Either way, Mr. Ryan has a few questions to answer and what I’m asking you to do is to go and kick a hole in the lives of two people who love each other deeply and bring one of them back to the police station and lock him up. And you have to do it because you’re a cop.”