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Handcuffs, Truncheon and a Polyester Thong

Urbane Publications Ltd

HANDCUFFS, TRUNCHEON AND A POLYESTER THONG

"Oh feckin' hell Miss, don't let go, I'll get some help ..."

As Moggie Benson's dulcet tones resonated around the vast warehouse, I quickly reached the conclusion that letting go hadn't actually crossed my mind. What had more than tentatively swept through it however, was how I'd got into this predicament in the first place?

Here I am, 35 feet up, swinging precariously from a rusty old girder by my fingertips listening to the echoing clang of metal hitting the ground below.

Let go or cling on for dear life?

No contest really. Fear has locked my fingers around it like a vice. I'm now glued to it like our local drug dealer Jerome Mills usually is to a bag of cannabis.

I don't know why running across the rooftop of the local scrapyard after Billy 'The Mog' Benson had seemed like a good idea. Moggie's a good commercial burglar, renowned for his cat-like agility and he was seriously living up to his nickname tonight. He'd made it easily over the top and across the back section, landing feet first on the flat roof below.

I hadn't.

The old corrugated iron roof had given way under my sylph-like footsteps in my size 4 SWAT boots, leaving me dangling helplessly like my next door neighbour's onesie on a washing line.

Looking down I try to adjust my eyes but I can only see momentary glints of moonlight flashing off the stacked metal, giving a strange eerie glow from beneath. If I could sigh at my stupidity I would, but the realisation I might not get out of this particular predicament alive has already started to choke what little breath I have left.

So, whilst I'm dangling here with nothing between me and the jagged scrap metal below, feeling the breeze whistle through my combat pants (which in turn is making me wish I'd worn a pair of thermal knickers rather than a polyester thong with a bow on the front), let me introduce myself.

I am Mavis Upton.

Constable 1261 Mavis Upton to be precise. Ace police driver and apprehender of naughty people; lover of crisps (any flavour); hater of big knickers, which if I survive this, I'll tell you all about later; daughter to Mrs Josie Upton, sister to Connie and Michael and Mum to a rather headstrong young lady called Ella ...

... and a woman with one failed marriage under her belt and a totally reckless disregard for danger, as evidenced by the aforementioned crisis I'm currently experiencing.

I start to inch myself along to see if I can swing my legs over the next girder.

"Nooooo Miss, don't do that!"

The frantic voice that screams out from the near darkness below makes my heart jump so much I almost lose my grip.

"Jeez Moggie give us a bit of a warning before you yell will you?" I let a small hiccup escape as I try to focus on the task in hand whilst I weigh up my options.

I could stay here as I am until help arrives, make some futile attempt to save myself or wait for the inevitable drop and get it over and done with. My numb fingers begin to make the decision for me as they start to peel themselves away from the cold metal of the girder.

Option number two suddenly seems like a good choice but nothing is close enough for me to reach. I couldn't be further away from any saving grace if I tried.

"AR21, AR21 what is your exact location Mavis, patrols are on their way?"

The crackle of the radio jolts me more than Moggie's shouting, sending my heart into a fury as it thumps against my ribcage. I manage to cling on, gently swaying.

A forceful gust of wind blows across the scrapyard. It catches my back, pushing me forward so my forearms scrape painfully on the bottom section of the girder. I have to resist my natural instinct to answer Heidi in the Control Room. Every fibre is screaming for me to press the button and shout up for urgent assistance but I know I'll never be able to hang on with one hand.

I feel sick.

My life proverbially flashes before my eyes as I look down into the waiting darkness. I'm going to die without even being given the chance to replenish my legendary Coral Blush lipstick or enjoy the salt 'n pepper chips I'd ordered from Mrs Wong's Chippy on Martins Lane for my scoff break.

Suddenly I don't feel so brave anymore.

"Miss, Miss, don't panic, I've found something, you just keep hanging on Miss."

Moggie's voice echoes from somewhere on the far side of the scrapyard amid the sounds of metal being smashed. My brain is going as numb as my fingers.

"You'd better bloody hurry up Moggie, I can't last much longer."

"Just hang on Miss!"

I want to cry but fear won't let me, a whimper catches in my throat. As the rust and metal began to bite into my fingers, they start to lose their grip.

One – Two – Three My left hand slips away from the girder leaving me clinging by my right hand. The muscles in my arm are burning; pain is tearing into my shoulder, making it feel as though it's being slowly ripped away from the socket.

"Moggie, Moggie ... for fuck's sake Moggie!"

Now I am crying. The salty tears roll down my cheeks. I think I'm screaming too, but I can't hear it. Maybe it's only in my head. This time I'm not going to make it. This time I've taken one chance too many.

I'm oblivious to the deep rumbling sound from below and the smell of diesel wafting up towards me as my remaining fingers begin to slip away from the girder in slow motion

And I'm falling.

Falling into the blackness ...

... for about two feet.

I land in a heap in the outstretched arms of Moggie, painfully smacking my shins against some sort of metal frame.

"Fuck, Miss, that was close," he guffawed, more in shock than humour.

"No shit Sherlock, you can say that again." I give him a sideways glance as I wipe away the cold sweat that's trickling down from beneath my fringe. Shaking the feeling back into my painful fingers, I let that comment sink in. "No, on second thoughts don't, just put me down please, you've still got your hand on my butt and that will never do."

Moggie hastily drops me down into the cage of the cherry picker, that by some miracle he had found in the corner of the warehouse. As the machinery whirred and whined taking us back down to ground level, I couldn't help but feel some sense of gratitude and a touch of admiration for Moggie.

He could have carried on with his escape and disappeared into the night with his spoils but he hadn't. He had stayed to save my life.

As the cage clunks onto the concrete floor amid mangled metal, I turn to him and put my hand on his shoulder.

"Thanks Moggie, I owe you one."

"That's okay Miss, always been sorta fond of youse like." He blushed and scrutinised the toes of his trainers.

"That's good mate, that's nice to hear. Right let's get down to business, you do not have to say anything, but it may harm your defence if you do not mention when questioned ..."

As the sound of klaxons blared on the breeze and the blue lights bounced from the stocks of metal and glass stored in the warehouse signalling my back up had arrived, he grinned and winked. "Arrr hey Miss that's proper shady that; not even a freebie graft for saving yer life?"

"No Moggie sorry, not even a freebie. You shouldn't have been thieving in the first place but I'll write you up for Court, they might even award you a fiver."

A smile breaks across the face of this career criminal. "Thanks Miss."

And I smile too as I click the handcuffs into place.

Welcome to my life as a police officer. Proud and sometimes loud, with a very wicked sense of humour!

AN EPIPHANY

"I don't know how many lives you think you've got left Mavis, but even the station cat is getting jealous." Bill Lawrence screwed up a sheet of paper he had been making notes on and aimed for the bin in the corner. He missed.

"I know Sarge, it was a serious lapse of judgement, but it turned out okay. I'm alive and Moggie will get three months minimum."

I tried to sound optimistic whilst discreetly examining the hairs in Bill's left ear. What was it with men? As soon as they lost the ability to retain hair on their heads they would make up for it with copious amounts in their nostrils and ears. Bill squirmed in the swivel chair, picked up a pen and plunged the end into his right ear, giving it a little jiggle. I grimaced.

"Here you go, sign at the bottom of this." He thrust the Incident Form towards me, offering the pen he had just used to excavate something disgusting out of his auditory orifice.

"Err it's okay Sarge, I've got my own thanks."

I left him examining the end of his biro and went to make myself a cup of tea in the night kitchen.

"Are you okay chick, heard you had a bit of a close shave tonight?"

I stopped stirring my tea and quietly acknowledged Marion's presence with a nod.

She plonked herself down at the table. "Milk no sugar for me lovely."

I obliged, using one of the better, less chipped mugs. Marion was nearing retirement and had taken up a post in the Divisional Control Room. Larger than life in personality as well as size, with her dark curly hair scraped back into a ponytail, she could pass for younger than her 54 years.

"The fact that I now owe my continued existence into another millennium to Moggie Benson has somehow made me a little reflective Marion ..." I laughed and took a slurp of my tea as she pushed a packet of custard creams towards me. "... of all the people hey? Suppose I should just accept it and be grateful."

She nodded sagely.

"It wasn't like that in my day Mave. Lost kids, shitty nappies and dog bites; that was all we dealt with on the Women's Section, not all these heroics that you girlies get up to now." She dunked her biscuit two seconds too long; lifting it up she inspected the missing bit and began to fish round with a spoon.

"It's 2008 Marion, things are different now, we've come a long way since then. Believe it or not they even let us drive fast cars and not just to the chippy!" I gave a dramatic bow.

She smirked and grabbed another biscuit. "What made you join Mave, can't have been easy, single mum, wrong side of thirty?"

I wasn't sure if that was a dig at my age, but decided to let it slide.

"It was an epiphany Marion, I had an epiphany." I looked out of the window, taking in the orange glow of the street lamps and my own reflection. "How long have you got?"

Marion touched my hand.

"As long as you want chick, as long as you want."

* * *

It was sometime during October 1988, whilst wearing a dreadful pair of day-glow pink legwarmers, kicking leaves and pushing Ella's tricycle as she skipped behind, that I suddenly decided I wanted to follow a lifelong ambition to join the police.

Just like that. My epiphany.

As I trampled through another pile of leaves, carefully avoiding a rather large doggie deposit but wheeling the bike through a smaller one, I excitedly began to plan my new career. After all, regardless of sex, status, quality or quantity of brain cells or even hair colour, this was supposed to be a time of equal opportunities. I had a passion, an idealistic idea to give something back, to make a difference.

I was quite good at making a difference; my Mum has always referred to me as being 'a bit different', maybe this was what she meant.

Maybe she knew I was destined for greater things.

I trundled the bike along an uneven bit of pavement, humming gently to myself. I have a rather lovely life. Okay I wasn't quite a merry divorcee, but I did smile a lot, I've got Ella, my beautiful but exasperating 7-year-old daughter, a cosy little seaside cottage to call home and a kitten, who was quite simply called Cat. What more could I want?

"Mum, Muuuum why aren't you listening to me? Can we jump puddles Mum, hey can we, can we?"

I turned to see Ella staring at me with her hands on her hips. "Sorry munchkin, I was just having a bit of a daydream, what's the matter?"

She looked up at me, eyes shining brightly as she wiped a rather large booger across the sleeve of her coat.

"Puddles Mum, can we jump puddles?"

Her excited chatter carried along with her as she started to run ahead. "Of course we can, but don't go too far ahead ... and watch out for ..." Too late.

As always Ella's knack for finding muck was a gift. Picking her up from the deep muddy puddle she had fallen hands and knees into, I allowed myself a wistful smile. Ella and muck always went hand-in-hand, just like I had been at her age, but mine was for mystery, wrongdoings, the Famous Five and excitement, which were actually my first forays into the realms of crime and detection. Grabbing a tissue from my pocket I wiped her face as she squirmed.

"Don't spit on it Mummy, that's so deeeegusting." Laughing at her choice of word, I carefully inspected the tissue.

"Ella, how come you can always find muck and trouble? I despair, I really do." Pulling away, she skipped ahead, her childish laughter drifting on the breeze.

'I despair; I really do ...'

I couldn't believe I'd just said that to my own daughter; I was turning into my Mum with her infuriatingly annoying expressions. I bit the inside of my lip as I remembered her berating me with the same words over the unfortunate incident with our rather odd next door neighbour when I was about Ella's age. Sitting down on a nearby bench where I could keep an eye on her as she played, I pulled my collar up and hunkered down with my hands in my pockets.

A solitary burnt orange leaf drifted slowly from a tree, finding rest in a small puddle. A sudden gust of wind scattered brown sycamore copters, picking them up and swirling them across the grass as I fondly remembered an age gone by, full of Enid Blyton, exciting adventures and red Clarks sandals.

DOGS, SOCKS & ENID BLYTON

Harold Kirby! Yes, that was his name. What a strange little man he had been.

Hunched and crumpled, with his grey hair and nobbled fingers and a dreadful taste in knitted cardigans. He must have been at least 102 if not more.

After reading The Famous Five Go to Smugglers Top, I'd suddenly decided that Harold was also a smuggler. Of what I had no idea, but it seemed incredibly exciting at the time and I just knew that dear old Enid would have agreed with me if she had seen him. On a nice, clean unrumpled page in my Investigations Diary, I'd diligently scribbled my first instruction. I, Mavis Jane Upton aged 7 3/4's was going to help catch a notorious criminal, just like Enid did in her books.

'1) Deesguys as a tree; ingreediants: cardbord box, green crayon, gloo'

In hindsight, it had not really been one of my better ideas. Running around Harold's garden wearing a cardboard box childishly decorated with leaves had seriously upset Harold's dog, a rather large specimen called Biff. Lolloping over, slobber flailing from each side of his jowls, he had sniffed and then piddled on my stick thin legs that were protruding from the bottom of the box.

In utter panic I'd run away squealing, toes squelching in my wee-riddled plimsolls, only to crash head-on into the brick gatepost which in turn caused me to swivel and become wedged in the wooden gate. Much to my despair, this had allowed Biff a second attempt at relieving his bladder on my legs and for me to wish that I'd cut some eyeholes in the ruddy box.

I had stood in the kitchen with two grazed knees, Mum glaring down at me. "Mavis, these are wet and smelly, what on earth have you been up to now?" I grimaced as she swung two patchy yellow socks towards me.

"Sink now young lady, you can wash them yourself."

Standing on the stool, socks pinched between my fingers, nose wrinkled, I'd argued.

"... but Mum, I was only doing what Enid does, I'm a Detective, I investigate things, that's what Detectives do!"

Mum had squirted a dollop of Fairy washing up liquid into the bright red bowl and raised one eyebrow.

"Mavis this really has to stop; the neighbours think there is something seriously wrong with you child. I despair, I really do!"

Half-heartedly I'd rubbed my socks together, making little impact on the yellowing stain whilst looking at Mum's face which had turned several shades from pink to red and back to pink again.

"If you carry on like this Mavis your father will stop your pocket money."

I'd thought about this threat for all of ten seconds, scraping the toe of one sandal on the top of the other and counting the cut out flower petals. "But Mum, he's. ..."

She had waved her hand to cut me off mid-sentence.

"Mavis, I won't tell you again, do as you're told, I'm warning you, go to your room ... now!"

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Excerpted from Handcuffs, Truncheon and a Polyester Thong by Gina Kirkham. Copyright © 2017 Gina Kirkham. Excerpted by permission of Urbane Publications Ltd.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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