Pop Goes the Weasel | страница 68

Southampton was awash with sex.

The streets were dark and so was Charlie’s mood. After her bollocking by Helen, her first instinct had been to hand in her warrant card and run home. But something had stopped her and she was relieved now, ashamed of her thin skin. What had she been expecting? Helen didn’t want her back and Charlie had played straight into her hands, allowing her enthusiasm to compromise her investigation into Sandra McEwan.

She burned with shame – what had happened to the talented cop she used to be? – and that shame drove her on now. Having failed in her first attempt to unmask Alexia’s killer, Charlie had gone back to basics, hitting the streets in search of information. Perhaps by talking to the street girls who seemed to be at the heart of McEwan’s war with the Campbells, she could dig up a lead. Schoolchildren were wandering home; it was only a little after 4 p.m., but already darkness was beginning to descend. That creeping, suffocating gloom that winter does so well. Charlie’s spirits dropped a notch further.

The prostitutes who hung about the port were happy enough to take a look at Charlie’s photo once they realized she wasn’t going to bust them. Their memories were hazy, but one long-serving girl eventually pointed Charlie in the direction of the Liberty Hotel, a filthy and dilapidated place that rented rooms by the hour rather than by the day. Charlie had visited it before and her heart sank at having to return. It was a place full of loneliness and despair.

She pressed the buzzer. Once, twice, three times before eventually the door opened a crack. She shoved her warrant card in the face of the Polish thug who ‘greeted’ her. Snarling, he let her inside, turning his back on her as he stalked up the stairs. Charlie knew he’d be little help – his job was to see all but say nothing – so Charlie focused her attention on the working girls who appeared with impressive regularity from behind the many closed doors. The building was a tall terraced house, set over four floors. It was astonishing to consider exactly how much copulation took place here every night. Used condoms littered the floor.

Charlie was talking to a girl named Denise, who was seventeen at best. She and her boyfriend had a drug habit and clearly it was up to Denise to earn the money for both of them to indulge. Why do these girls value themselves so cheaply? This was the bottom end of the market – the more expensive girls plied their trade in the north of the city. Down by the docks you were expected to do anything for a few pounds, however painful or unpleasant.