PC Angus MacDuff didn’t want to blow his cover. He lowered his voice and spoke in a whisper into the walkie-talkie pressed to his ear.
“I’ve got it covered, Sarg’. Over and out.”
Crouched at the side of his unmarked patrol car, the young policeman hid behind a line of parked supermarket trolleys where he had an excellent view of all the comings and goings at Sainsbury’s and at Homebase beyond. Acting on a tip-off, his mission was to bring in for questioning a woman wearing a denim jacket and white jeans, who was about to make off with a black wheelbarrow.
PC MacDuff tried to stuff the walkie-talkie in his back pocket but misjudged the pocket and it clattered onto the tarmac.
“What the …?” came the irate voice of his partner from the open window of their patrol car.
PC MacDuff whirled around with a finger pressed to his pursed lips to silence his partner, the plain-clothed detective. He hoped the clatter had not broken his cover, but sighed in relief to see that everyone within his field of surveillance continued to go about their business, and their shopping, without a second glance in his direction. Carefully he picked up the walkie-talkie. He checked his inner pocket for his set of handcuffs in readiness for the imminent arrest.
“Get back in the car NOW!” said his scowling partner through gritted teeth.
She flung open the car door behind him and the police dog in the back of the car whimpered for his attention.
His partner was always getting at him and Angus Macduff was fed up with it. But PC MacDuff had another ongoing problem – his police helmet was a size too big and kept slipping sideways. I bet older policemen don’t have this problem, thought Angus. But just then the sliding doors of Homebase opened and into bright sunlight from the interior gloom emerged the keenly awaited suspect pushing a shiny new black wheelbarrow.
Young PC MacDuff held his gaze firmly on the woman striding across the tarmac towards his hide-out, a Homebase receipt pinned between her teeth.
Shoppers collecting and returning supermarket trolleys exchanged grins as they caught sight of the little boy in his fancy dress outfit crouched by the side of his mother’s car.
“Mum’ll kill you if she sees you there,” his sister hissed.
She grabbed her little brother by the scruff of his 8 year-old sized policeman’s jacket and hauled him in to the car just as the woman rounded the bonnet of their car. She was Angus MacDuff’s white-jeaned, denim-jacketed mother.
PC Angus MacDuff’s cover was well and truly blown. |
