Grant felt sleepy and the cigarette helped keep him awake. He had never got used to shift work; his biological rhythms, or whatever they were, had never adapted. When he lay down his head in the morning as the neighbor’s kids were going to school, the postman was doing his rounds and everyone else was off to work, he could never get to sleep. Especially if the sun were shining. And then there was Janet, bless her soul, doing her best, trying hard to be as quiet as she could around the house, and Sarah, only six months, crying for feeding and nappy-changing. And the bills to pay, and… Christ, he wasn’t going to think about that. At least the job got him out of the house, away from all that for a while.

A lorry rumbled by. Grant flicked the stub of his cigarette out of the window and heard it sizzle as it hit a puddle. Occasionally, voices cut through the static on the police radio, but the messages weren’t for them.

“Shall we belt up and bugger off, then?” said Barry. He screwed up the wrapper of his Mars bar and put it in his pocket. Ever the careful one, Grant thought, with an affectionate smile. Wouldn’t even be caught littering, wouldn’t Barry.

“Might as well.” Grant reached for his belt. Then they heard the squealing sound of rubber on wet tarmac. “What the fuck was that?”

On the main road, a north-bound car skidded as it turned the bend too fast, then righted itself.

“Shall we?” said Barry.

“My pleasure.”

Grant loved it when the lights were flashing and the siren screaming. First he was pushed back in the seat by the force when he put his foot down, and then he felt as if he were taking off, seeming somehow to be magically freed from all the restraints of the road: not just the man-made rules, but the laws of nature. Sometimes, Grant even felt as if they were really taking off, wheels no longer on the ground.

But there was no chase to be had here; it was over before it began. The car was about two hundred yards ahead of them when its driver seemed to realize they meant business. He slowed down as they caught up and pulled over to the side of the road, spraying up water from the hedgerow. His number-plate was too muddy to read.

Grant pulled up behind him, and Barry got out to approach the car.

It wasn’t likely to be much, Grant thought as he sniffed the fresh night air through the open window – maybe a drunk, maybe a few outstanding parking tickets – but at least it was something to relieve the boredom for a few minutes.

He could hear perfectly clearly when Barry asked the driver to turn off his ignition and present his driving documents. The driver did as he was told. Barry looked at the papers and passed them back. Next, he asked the man if he had been drinking. Grant couldn’t hear the man’s reply, but it seemed to satisfy Barry. Grant knew he would be listening for slurred words and sniffing for booze on the driver’s breath.

After that, Barry asked the man where he had been and where he was going. Grant thought he heard the man mention Princes Risborough.

No other cars passed. The night was quiet and Grant caught a whiff of beech leaves and cherry wood on the damp air. He thought he heard some cows low in the distance and, farther still, a nightingale.

Then Barry asked the man to get out of the car and clean off his number-plate. Grant heard him explain patiently that it was an offense to drive with a number-plate that is “not easily distinguishable” and smiled to himself at the stilted, textbook phrase. But the man would get off with a caution this time; Barry seemed satisfied with his behavior.

The man got back in the car and Grant heard Barry speak over his personal radio.

“465 to Control.”

“465 go ahead.”

“Ten nine vehicle check please.”

The voices crackled unnaturally over the country night air.

“Pass your number.”

“Mike four, three, seven, Tango Zulu Delta.”

“Stand by.”

Grant knew it would take three or four minutes for the operator to check the number on the computer, then, all being well, they could be on their way.

Barry and the driver seemed to be chatting amiably enough as they waited. Grant looked at the newly cleaned number-plate and reached idly for the briefing-sheet beside him. There seemed to be something familiar about it, something he ought to remember.

He ran his finger down the list of stolen cars. No, not there. He wouldn’t remember any of those numbers; there were always too many of them. It had to be something more important: a vehicle used in a robbery, perhaps? Then he found it: M437 TZD, gray Granada.

Suddenly, he felt cold. The owner was wanted in connection with a murder in North Yorkshire. Possibly armed and dangerous. Shit. All of a sudden, Barry seemed to be taking a hell of a long time out there.

A number of thoughts passed quickly through Grant’s mind, the first of which was regret that they didn’t do things the American way. Get the guy out of the vehicle, hands stretched on the roof, legs apart, pat him down. “Assume the position, asshole!” Why pretend they were still living in a peaceful society where the local bobby was your best friend? Christ, how Grant wished he had a gun.

Should he go out and try to get Barry to the car, use some excuse? He could say they’d been called to an emergency. Could he trust himself to walk without stumbling, to speak without stuttering? His legs felt like jelly and his throat was tight. But he felt so impotent, just watching. All he could hope was that the radio operator would understand Barry’s predicament and give the guy a clean bill of health. According to the information on the sheet, the man, Arthur Jameson, didn’t even know he was wanted.

The radio crackled back into life.

“Control to 465.”

“Go ahead, over.”

“Er… Mike four, three, seven, Tango Zulu Delta… No reports stolen. Er… Do you require keeper details over?”

“Affirmative.”

More static. Grant tensed in his seat, hand on the door-handle. Too many pauses.

“Keeper is Arthur Jameson, 47 Bridgeport Avenue, Leeds. Er… is keeper with you over?”

“Affirmative. Any problem?”

She was blowing it, Grant sensed. Someone, probably the super, was standing over her trying to help her calmly get Barry back to the car and the driver on his way, but she was nervous, halting. It was all taking far too long, and if the suspect couldn’t sense there was something wrong over the radio, then he was an idiot.

“No reports stolen.”

“You already told me that, love,” said Barry. “Is something wrong?”

“Sorry… er… 465… Stand by.”

Grant tightened his grip on the door-handle. This was it. He wasn’t going to stand around and let his partner, who had probably dozed off at the briefing and to whom the number obviously meant bugger-all, just stand there and take it.

But before he got the door half open, he saw Barry, all sixteen stone and six foot two of him, drop to the wet road clutching the side of his neck, from which a dark spray of blood fountained high and arced to the ground. Then he heard the shots, two dull cracks echoing through the dark countryside.

Left foot still in the car, right foot on the road, Grant hesitated. Mistake. His last thought was that it was so bloody unfair and pointless and miserable to die like this by a roadside outside High Wycombe. Then a bullet shattered the windscreen and took him full in the face, scattering blood, teeth and bone fragments all over the car. After its echo had faded, the Granada revved up and sped off into the night, and the nightingale sang again into the vacuum of silence the car left behind.