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“Sorry to bother you, sarge, but my computer has died. I tried the others, and they died too. So I’m going to use the one in your office if that’s OK?”
“Well, yes, but hang on, what do you mean, all the computers have died?” Charlie asked. Because this was yet another kind of sabotage. Maybe not as dramatic as setting fire to a car, but it was the unseen enemy once more.
He heard Eddy’s breathing, as if he had more to say. He did.
“I was getting some weird messages. They just appeared in the corner of the screen.”
“And?” Charlie said.
“And if I ignored them, they went away after a minute or so. But they were irritating as hell, so I closed one rather than wait for it to go. Which is when the computer died.”
“OK.” Charlie said, “I’ll bite. What are they, these weird messages?”
“No easy way to say it, but they’re all about you. About that court case in Spain. Newspaper headlines. Bits of the evidence. Pictures of you. Things you said.”
“Tom had one earlier,” Charlie said. “They were on the other computers too? So Patsy and Mags will have seen them?”
“I guess,” Eddy said.
Charlie would have to resign. There was no way past this.
“What’s wrong?” Tom asked.
Charlie shook his head. What could he say? I made a mistake, picked up the wrong bloke on holiday, and someone is using it to disrupt the investigation. The bleakness he felt must have shown on his face, because the next thing he was breathing in stale cigarette smoke and his arm was being clutched, strong fingers digging into his bicep. Ravensbourne grasped Charlie’s phone.
“Edwards,” she snapped, “what?”
“Something odd with the computers, boss.”
“Eddy…”
Eddy told her. Without comment she ended the call and gave Charlie his phone back.
“Right,” she said, shaking Charlie’s arm. “The entire bloody country knows you shagged the wrong bloke. I don’t care, Pennant here keeps giving you googly eyes so I don’t think he cares, and if Eddy cares he can talk to me about it. So you can either go to pieces or get on with the job, and we don’t have time for you to go to pieces.”
“No, boss,” Charlie said, hoping that was the right answer, or should it have been “Yes, boss?”
“Charlie!” Ravensbourne said, bringing his focus back into the room.
“Computers, boss. Mags or Patsy, I don’t remember which said that Harrington-Bowen’s sergeant used to send pop-up dick pics to the women in the station. Jared Brody. Could it be him? Disrupting all the computers? Is that even possible?”
There was a gentle knock at the door. Ann poked her head round. “David from Finance is here,” she said.
Tom nodded, and the emaciated Finance Director entered.
“Let me guess,” Tom said, “your computer system denies you access to the information you need?”
David looked puzzled. “No, Principal. I came to tell you that there are no records of any additional donations to college funds of the kind you suggested.”
17
Thanks, but no thanks
Tuesday 5pm
The luxurious office fell silent when David left. Ann was still in the doorway, and she came to attention first.
“More coffee, I think,” she said.
