Chapter 22: A New Week

Valerie Haste was standing in the small back room behind the hostel in Dean Street. The Dangerfield boy hadn’t proved to be very resistant when it came to interrogation. For all his juvenile bravado, Valerie was convinced that he’d been encouraged to plot Phyllis’s kidnap and rape. It hadn’t been long before he’d told his interrogators about this place but Valerie didn’t think it was likely to be much help.

The people at the hostel claimed they didn’t know anything about the people that came and went to this small room. Well, they would say that, wouldn’t they? Now she was inside it there wasn’t much to see. A few chairs, a table near the barred window, the television, of course, with no ident card reader and a DVD player. It was pretty obvious what sort of things would have been played on that but there wasn’t any trace of any of it.

In the corner of the room was a rubbish bin. Valerie tipped out the contents. A bundle of brown tea-stained cloth turned out to be a set of overalls. Valerie guessed this would have been worn by the absconder from the Sunrise Tea Parlour. She bagged it up for identification, assuming that anyone from Sunrise took the slightest notice of what their slaves were wearing.

There was depressingly little else; there were no printed papers in the bin. Valerie had hoped to find a discarded flyer for a meeting or some other piece of group propaganda but whatever had gone on here, it looked like people had got together by word of mouth. All she found were a few cigarette packets and some sweet wrappers - all, very depressingly, not illegal.

Back in the Police Station, Valerie was keen to get Jim to identify others in the group - whatever it was. “You know they won’t be in the least worried that you’ve been arrested?”

Jim was sitting with his wrists cuffed behind him, a precaution that had been taken because of the times he’d suddenly erupted into violence during questioning. “Who would that be?”

“Your friends in Dean Street. Well, I say friends. I mean not really friends to set you up like this, eh? What did they do? Tell you you had a right to express your feelings for Ms Dangerfield? Say she shouldn’t be allowed to deny you?” Valerie had a good idea of the sort of arguments these male groups used. “Did they get you the knife? Did they get you the condoms?”

Jim looked sulky and said nothing.

“We know there was at least one sponsorship absconder using that place. That will mean there will have been all sorts of illegal activities going on from there. Did they tell you they’d get you a new ident card? Or maybe they were going to get you a room where you could take Ms Dangerfield? How was that going to work anyway?”

“It wasn’t like that. We were going to be together. Those things - in the rucksack - they were only to show her I was serious. She would have seen things my way. We’d have been happy there. Her daughter’s left home now. She needs someone more than that houseboy.”

“What makes you think that? Did she tell you that? Or did they tell you that, your friends in the back room?”

“No. I could tell. I mean she has friends who live like that. We could have been like Mrs Higgs and her husband.”

“Husband?”

“Yes. Sure. I told you. There are people that live like that. We could have lived like that.”

Valerie was feeling sorry for Jim Wheeland. He was obviously deluded. Whoever he had been talking to in the Dean Street room must have encouraged him but maybe he really didn’t know who they were. She didn’t feel she was getting very far. Unless there was something to the Higgs thing. Husbands were pretty unusual these days and at least it was something for her to have a go at.

...

In her office in Gerard Street, Madame Chao looked at the bundle of clothing that Valerie Haste was showing her. “Yes, could be runaway’s,” she said. “When they work with tea it makes overalls that colour. You think you find him?”

Valerie shook her head. “No, not really. But it helps build up a picture of what’s going on with the underground groups and you never know.”

“I like how you work Detective Sergeant. Thorough. Realistic. Methodical.”

“Like your Kòngzhì Rén?”

“Ha! You are well briefed. Yes, I think your methods must be much like ours. A systematic way of doing things. A thoughtful approach to each problem. Which reminds me, thank you for filling the gap left by runaway. I shall tell Ms Daniels that you have helped a lot.”

“I should have told you about his - well - dress sense.”

“Cha! Makes no difference here.” Madam Chao laughed. “He dress as we like but interesting to have girls get a different challenge in their domination. Not sure they will have encountered anything like young Sumpter before.”

There was a knock on the office door.

“Come!” Madam Chao announced.

A dark haired girl in Sunrise uniform opened the door. “Oh. I’m sorry Madam Chao but you were going to talk to the JUMIST trainees.”

“That’s all right Wan Yu. I think the Detective Sergeant and I have finished. Do we need to do any more now?”

“No, that’s fine, Madam Chao,” Valerie responded. “I’ll get back to you if we have any more news but in the meantime, good luck with Sumpter.”

Wan Yu giggled at the mention of Gary’s name. “He’s a confused boy. Likes to wear women’s clothes but not so keen on being told which women’s clothes to wear. Thinks trousers not for him! Even with zip at side.”

Valerie smiled. “Like I said, good luck,” she said as she left.

Wan Yu and Madam Chao made their way to the training room. Fara in her yellow cheongsam and Collette, Anna and Daphne in their white ones were waiting together with Tsai Lin.

“Good morning ladies,” Madam Chao announced. “More work today, I am afraid, but still much to learn.”

The girls smiled, their enthusiasm for learning the arts of Kòngzhì Rén was undiminished.

“Miss Fara, you will start more work on Pressure of Pain for Green Qipao level. Miss Collette and Miss Daphne, Tsai Lin tells me you should be ready for Yellow Qipao test this week. Miss Anna still work to do on Path of the Cane, I believe, but will soon catch up others.”