Chapter One
The Start of the Odd Squad

I prepared myself for my first day back as a detective with North Yorkshire Police, after an extended leave of absence. Most of the women detectives went into work in casual or practical clothes, trousers and shirt/blouse with comfortable flat shoes, but I had decided that I needed to make a statement and was dressed to the nines in a Scarlet shift dress with black bolero jacket and with 3” heels. I had my hair cut, coloured, and styled the previous Saturday, along with a full beauty treatment, waxing, eyebrow shaping, nails shaped and polished a bright red to match my dress. Content with how I looked, I picked up my shoulder bag, took a deep breath and went down to my car to start a much changed career.

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18 months earlier in the offices of Detective Chief Superintendent Charles Scargill

“Good morning Inspector Rowntree, you’ve asked to see me, what can I do for you today?”

“Good morning Sir thanks for seeing me Sir at such short notice. I am requesting a leave of absence for 18 months for medical reasons, and I hope to be able to resume my career when things are all dealt with.”

“You do realise that someone else will have to fill your role and that I can’t guarantee that you will resume at your current position, it is likely that you will have to drop down one-or two levels on your return. Am I allowed to ask what the medical issue is or would you rather not say at this point?”

I swallowed hard and took a deep breath before replying. “I have decided that I want to fulfil a lifetime secret longing and become a woman, and rather than causing embarrassment to my colleagues as I travel along the path I would like to go through it all in private, without constant discussions and comments that would come my way. I realise that this will come as a shock and that it will take some getting used to, but I believe that in compliance with the force’s anti-discrimination policy that transgender rights are covered.”

“ My God, Les, you’ve taken me aback, it’s the first time I have been faced with something like this, I don’t understand why you want to put yourself through this, but I will discuss this with the Assistant Chief Constable and with our HR people to see what we can do in the force to smooth things over. You have been an excellent and successful officer and I would be sorry to see you go so we will do what we can for you. Where has all this come from, you’ve never to the best of my knowledge come across as anything but a typical bloke, you are one of the last people that I would have expected this from?”

“Without getting into too much personal detail Sir, it is something that has always been in there nagging away at me, I have always felt that I should have been a girl and woman. My parents have recently died and I have just had my divorce from Susan finalised, and if I am ever going to start a new life as a woman, this is the ideal time to do it. As far as work is concerned, I have recently completed all my major cases, anything that is left over can easily be picked up by my sergeants or by my replacement.”

“Ok, but do you really need 18 months off, the longer you are away, the harder it will be to fit you into the teams again.”

“Unfortunately that is a realistic timescale, I have a few things to sort out first and then have to live as a woman for 12 months as a life-test, before they will operate. During that time I will be taking feminisation drugs which would slowly soften and alter my appearance, and with the banter culture in the office, I would rather go on leave of absence. After the operation there will be a medical recovery period and then I would like some time to re-adjust psychologically and emotionally before coming back to work.”

“ Ok Les, I’ll get things in motion, thanks for your past service, and after you get yourself sorted out, I’m sure that we can find a role for you, if you’d decide that it is still what you want to do.”

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16 months earlier

Officially nothing was said in the office about why I was leaving, merely that I was taking a sabbatical to sort things out in my personal life, what the rumour mill was saying I didn’t know or care. I left on good terms with all the people in the office with hopes that I would return refreshed and ready to go again.

My ex-wife had left me for another man with a more stable and reliable work life, who didn’t work unpredictable hours and need to cancel planned social events at a moment’s notice when a major case suddenly appeared. She moved in with him, so we were able to sell the house and most of the contents, split the proceeds and other finances and go our separate ways.

I bought an apartment in York, in one of the new developments just inside the city walls, the sort of place where neighbours gave a nod of the head in passing, but generally left each other alone to live their lives in private.

I bought the flat in my new name of Julie Rowntree, which had been officially changed, bought some furniture, kitchen equipment and various domestic accessories, and moved in, as Julie. As far as anyone was concerned I was a 35 yearly female recent divorcee who was trying to start a new life. all of my male clothes had been sent to charity shops or put out for recycling or as rubbish, I had no intention of needing them again. Initially all my new clothes were ordered online, thank heavens for internet shopping, in the early days it saved a lot of embarrassment.

I had started on a course of hormone treatment and as far as I was concerned i was well on my way to a new life.

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The next 15 months

I slowly adjusted to my new life and began to feel comfortable going out in public as a woman. The hormones were gradually kicking in, my breasts were developing nicely and I was soon able to display a bit of cleavage, my hips and bottom were getting fleshier and my waist slimming, so I was developing a nice little figure, although it still needed to fill out a bit more. Following on-line tutorials I soon became adept at applying my make-up and the morning ritual soon became routine rather than a new exciting adventure.

As I became more passable and confident, I started talking with some of the other neighbours in the apartments and became particularly friendly with Carol Stephenson whose flat was just along the corridor from me. We began to go out together, to the pub, restaurants and the theatre and became the best of friends. Whilst she didn’t know about my situation, she became a role model for me to base myself on, copying her mannerisms and way of talking and expressing herself. I was really sad when she left after 6 months to go and live with her boyfriend just outside the city.It was coming up to the time for my reassignment surgery and I really could have done with a close friend at the time.

With a mixture of excitement, and worry that things could go wrong, I went into hospital in Leeds for my surgery and when I signed the consent form it hit me that this was it and there was to be no going back. I woke up still feeling groggy from the anaesthetic and was so full of drugs that I didn’t really feel any pain or discomfort and wondered whether the operation had been postponed.

“Hello Julie, welcome back to the world and welcome to the world of womanhood. The operation was a great success and the surgeon is very pleased at how realistic your new body is and when you are healed nobody will be able to tell without an internal examination.” said Sinead the smiling Irish nurse who was looking after me. “You need to stay in bed for the moment so as not to strain any stitches, but don’t worry, you have a catheter fitted so there should be no little accidents.”

I nodded off back to sleep while my body recovered, and woke up a few hours later to see a friendly smiling face.

“ Hi Carol, what are you doing here, how did you know where I was?”

“ I popped round to the flat to see you, obviously you weren’t there, but there was a letter to you from the hospital in your post box confirming your appointment for surgery which I apologise for being nosey and reading, and came here to see how you are. You stupid girl, you should have told me all about this, i could have been there to support you, I’m sure you needed someone to talk to and hold your hand.”

“Are you not disgusted and embarrassed at how you find me, you must have thought we were close friends but I have been keeping a massive secret from you. All those times I was with you I was living a lie.”

“I’ve had time to think about it travelling here and watching you while you have been sleeping, you were not living a lie when you were out with me, it was your previous life that was a lie. As far as I am concerned you are the Julie that I have been best friends with for most of the year and hope that your new life will not stop us still being best friends.”

Due to a mixture of emotional stress, discomfort, and relief, I broke down into tears and asked Carol to give me a hug. Womanhood was definitely taking over all aspects of my life !

After a lot of advice from the medical staff on how to treat my new body, and some counselling to ensure that I could cope with what I had done to me, I was discharged a few days later. Carol was there to drive me back home and she stayed with me for a few days while I recovered, until I assured her that I could manage on my own.

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The next 2 months

I was soon up and about starting getting into fit condition again with gentle walks which turned into jogging, then added aerobic classes and fitness training. i had lost a lot of the strength and stamina that I previously had, but my body was now more supple and movements smoother. I decided that I was fit enough and mentally strong enough return to work.

“ Good morning can I speak to DCS Scargill, please, tell him that Inspector Rowntree is on the line.”

“Good morning Les it is good to hear from you again, what can I do for you?”

“ Actually it is Julie now Sir, legally and physically. When I requested leave of absence it was for 18 months, that is almost over and I would like to make arrangements to come back to work.”

“ Apologies for getting your name wrong, it will take some getting used to. I will have to work out where we can slot you in, obviously your old position was filled by someone else, I will have to see where we have any vacancies, leave it with my and I’ll come back to you in a few days. How are you anyway, are you sure that you are physically and mentally well enough to come back. I will advise you now that it will not be easy, you will be faced with a lot of ribbing and comments, you know the culture in the squad rooms. If it gets out of hand HR people will step in but you will have to tolerate a lot of it by just gritting your teeth.”

“ I would expect nothing less Sir, the squad rooms can be a bit schoolboyish but it helps to relieve the stress of the job. most of the others know the rules against discrimination and bullying and where the boundaries are, as long as it stays on the right side of the border, I can put up with it.”

“ Welcome back then…er…Julie, and we’ll see you soon.”

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The next month

Determined to make a professional impression I dressed in a smart formal Navy-blue skirt suit and azure blouse with white lace trims, and 3” heels, arrived at County headquarters bright and early, and signed in at reception.

“ Good morning, I’’m here to see DCS Scargill, I’m Julie Rowntree.” which caused a slight raise of the eyebrows from the girl at the desk, but she just smiled and told me that someone would be down for me soon.

Reception suddenly got very busy with lots of people passing through, most of whom seemed to glance in my direction. Obviously news of my return and my new appearance had spread on the gossip mill like wildfire, after all we were in police headquarters and information was their business, but I just sat there calmly and smiled back at them all.

Soon I was collected and shown to DCS Scargill’s office and walked in to see that he was accompanied by two women.

“Hello again ..er,, Julie, it’s good to see you back. This is Mary Marshall from HR to make sure that this all goes smoothly and in accordance with our rules and policies, and this is DC Trudy Terry, who we will come back to later. At the time you requested leave of absence I advised you that it might be difficult for you to return at your previous level of Inspector, and that has turned out to be the case, there are currently no suitable vacancies. However I can reinstate you as a Detective Sergeant, if you can live with that. Your salary will be reduced accordingly but all your pension rights etc will remain unchanged, that is correct is it not, Mary?” A nod of the head confirmed that.

“The other thing is that all the squads are up to complement and It has been difficult to find a role for you. However the teams in York covering both the City and the outer areas are pretty stretched dealing with major murder, fraud cases and drug-dealing, and a lot of the more minor or unusual, or difficult, cases are being left on the shelf. For various reasons, which I will leave for her to tell you about, DC Terry is in a similar situation regarding getting a suitable placement. I would like you two to work together as a team, maybe being a bit unorthodox and outside the normal boundaries, working as a sort of ‘hit-squad’ reporting directly back to me. You will be based at the York headquarters in Fulford Rd, with an office to yourselves, but will be free from the operational structure that applies there. How does that sound to you?”

“ I take it that DC Terry knows my background and why I am in this situation and is happy to work alongside me, but before I accept your offer I would like to spend some time with her for us to get to know each other better to see whether we can get along together, if that is acceptable. Leave my formal appointment ‘off the books’ for a couple of days while we sort ourselves out.”

“That’s fine L…Julie, get to know each other and we’ll take it from there.”

We went off to a wine bar to find out about each other and work out where we would go from here.

“Right Trudy, I don’t know about what you think, but it seems obvious to me that nobody wants us on their team, this idea of a special ‘hit-squad’ is just a way of keeping us on the books without a proper role and making sure that they comply with anti-discrimination policies. You know about me and why people don’t want me on their team, they think that they will feel uncomfortable and not know how to relate to me, but what is your story, what have you done to upset them all?”

“Before I tell you my story, I can’t understand why they can’t relate to you, the way you dress, act, and speak just screams ‘woman’ to me and you should be treated like any other female on the team, and you are much more feminine than many of the butch girls on the force anyway.

As for me, I upset the ‘boy’s club’ by complaining about one of my senior officers trying it on with me and that was followed by offensive sexist comments and patronising attitudes from the team. I was even accused of being a ‘man-hating feminist dyke’. It ended up that nobody wanted to work with me and I was sidelined and ignored on all the active cases and became nothing more than an office dogsbody doing all the stuff that nobody else wanted to do. I joined the force on the graduate ‘fast-track scheme’ for detectives rather than go through the ranks in uniform, and that, and the fact that I was the only female on our team, caused a lot of jealousy and fuelled the resentment against me. It got to the stage where I was considered a disruptive influence and they have been trying to find something for me to do, and you have been elected to have me work with you and bring me under control.”

“Just so I know how to deal with other people, are you a ‘man-hating feminist dyke’ or are your old team just a bunch of overgrown schoolboys who don’t like to be bettered by a ‘Smart-Alec’ girl, and who treat women as inferiors only fit to make the tea and type up the reports for them?” That brought a big smile to Trudy’s face for the first time since I met her, I had obviously struck a chord with her.

“You know Julie, for a recent convert to the better half of humanity, you catch on quick. I am not a man-hater in general, just the idiots and perverts I was working with, and I can tell you some stories to prove that I am not a ‘dyke’, but if standing up for my rights and expecting to be treated fairly and with respect makes me a feminist, I plead guilty to that.”

“I think you and I can get on and work well together, tell me a bit about cases you have worked on and how you contributed, and which of the schoolboys took all the glory for your efforts.”

Over lunch we got to know each other better, and I soon decided that she was a bright girl who could make a good career as a detective if she was given a fair chance, and I liked her personally. For the last 2 years she had been based at County Headquarters in the market town of Northallerton, about 30 miles North of our proposed office in the City of York and was living in a bedsit near the station.

“As we are going to be working together in York why not move down to there, it will save you the best part of an hour each way in travelling every day, and, no disrespect to Northallerton, there is a lot more to do in York when you are not working. I am not looking for a long-term flatmate, but if you want somewhere to stay while you look around for something, I have a spare room which you are welcome to use, no strings attached, although that might fuel the rumours about your sexuality, if the narrow-minded bigots count me as a female, that is.”

”I love your sense of humour Julie, you are not afraid to laugh at yourself and if the bosses want ‘unorthodox and thinking outside the box’, I think they may have found it in the two of us.”

Two days later both of us were in the office of DCS Scargill agreeing our new terms of office, which I think surprised him as I am sure that he was expecting me to reject the demotion and being sidelined out of the mainstream investigation teams, and that Trudy would not be comfortable working with a transexual like me. We were told to sign in at at York the following Monday, and to liaise with - I noted that it was not ‘report to’ - Detective Inspector Charles Wainwright who would make arrangements to accommodate us.

Over the rest of the week Trudy left her bedsit and moved her few personal belongings into my spare bedroom. After 18 months living on my own, suddenly having to make allowances for someone else in the apartment took some getting used to. I was not particularly tied to any routine, and was not particularly a ‘neat freak’, but Trudy was a free-spirit who did things as the mood took her. Within a couple of days her room was like a war zone, with clothes strewn over the furniture and even on the floor, and the kitchen was not much better, she believed in having things to hand rather than put away in cupboards, but I did really enjoy her company and easy manner.

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Monday morning I prepared myself for my first day back as a detective after my extended leave of absence. Most of the women detectives went into work in casual or practical clothes, trousers and shirt/blouse with comfortable flat shoes, but I had decided that I needed to make a statement and was dressed to the nines in a scarlet shift dress with black bolero jacket and with 3” heels. I had my hair cut, coloured, and styled the previous Saturday, along with a full beauty treatment, waxing, eyebrow shaping, nails shaped and polished a bright red to match my dress. Content with how I looked , I picked up my shoulder bag, took a deep breath and went down to my car to start a much changed career. Until we knew what we were to be working on, Trudy and I agreed to travel separately and met in the car park and went into reception together.

‘Good morning, I am DS Julie Rowntree and this is DC Trudy Terry, reporting in, I believe you have an office assigned for our use.”

“Yes, it has all been arranged, go up the stairs to the 1st floor , left down the corridor and it’s the last door on the right, and DI Wainwright has asked that you go to see him as soon as you arrived, turn right at the stairs and it’s the first on the right.”, the rather worried looking receptionist replied

“We’ll get settled in first then pop along to see him in a short while, thanks for your help Sheila.” Like all the station staff she wore an ID badge on a strap around her neck.

We found our way easily, recognised it by the paper nameplate on the door ‘The Odd Squad’. Calling it an office was a misuse of the English language, it was windowless and not much bigger than a store room with one desk, two chairs, one telephone and a computer that belonged in a museum.

“Come on Trudy, don’t bother putting things out, we need to go and see DI Wainwright.”

“Glad you could find the time at last to come to report to me Sergeant Rowntree, I did request that you come up on your arrival” we were greeted in a rather rude, arrogant, and patronising manner.

“Good morning to you too, Inspector Wainwright, and with respect I was instructed to liaise with you, not report to you, I was led to believe that my unit was semi-independent reporting directly back to the Chief Super, but if you would like to confirm that with him please feel free to do so. At the same time you can also tell him that i consider the facilities that you have provided are totally inadequate, we would like a decent sized office properly furnished and with decent technology and facilities, as are provided for the other teams here. I don’t want to get off on the wrong foot with you but we need to establish the ground rules of how we work together.”

Trudy looked at me, amazed at what I had just said, and then over at Charles Wainwright who looked like he was about to explode and burst a blood vessel, and she followed me as I stood up and left the room. “We are going out to get a feel for our new patch and when we return later we trust that you will have got things sorted out, and by the way I like the nameplate can you arrange to get it fixed to our new office door.”

“Wow boss, that was incredible, you certainly know how to make an entrance, what do you think he is going to do.”

“He’ll do exactly as I asked, he knows that I am right, don’t worry about it, In my old days it would be called a bit of ‘seeing who has got the biggest dick’, but I guess that does not apply anymore. Let’s find somewhere to have a coffee and a cake and go for a wander to give him a couple of hours to sort things out.”

We got back just over two hours later to be met with a big beaming smile from Sheila. “Your office has been moved it is now first on the left at the top of the stairs. Your conversation with the DI was overheard and details have spread like a virus through the building, you have earned a lot of respect, but have also made a few enemies, watch your backs !”

The replacement office was a big improvement, big window looking out over the grounds, two desks and chairs plus spares for visitors, two modern laptops with add-on screens, and even a small kitchen tray with a kettle and a supply of tea coffee and milk. Wainwright had obviously been on to headquarters and had been told in no uncertain terms to behave himself. We soon had a visit from one of the IT specialists who set us up with access to the police network, internet, and the email system, and were left in peace to settle in.

Late morning there was a rap on the office door and Wainwright barged in without being invited. “I trust the new office facilities are now to your liking.” he said with a lot of sarcasm. “Apologies if we got off on the wrong foot earlier, I was not fully aware of your role here. Let’s hope we can forget all about it and work together in a professional manner.” He obviously had been really put in his place.

Holding back an urge to rub his face in it, I just smiled sweetly back at him. “Forget it, let’s start afresh. Take a seat and tell us what you have got for us that has been gathering dust on the shelves?”

“They are not that old, but we have just not got round to dealing with them, we have other priorities. There are the files on four cases that need sorting, I’ll leave them with you, to deal with as you see fit. Read through them and if you have any questions of my team please ask.”

“ Ok, I might pop along later. By the way, you have a very imaginative team, I like the latest addition to the nameplate.” I said as a parting shot as he left the office.

“What was that comment about the nameplate all about.” Trudy asked with a questioning look on her face.

“ Didn’t you look at the door on the way in? As well as ‘The Odd Squad’, we are now also called ‘The Sweeties’. I reckon that is a play on our names, as well as a reference to our gender and your rumoured sexual preferences. In case you haven’t put two and two together, Rowntree and Terry are, or were, major world-famous chocolate and sweet manufacturers based in York, although they have now been swallowed up into international business conglomerates. The brands are both still around, but Terry’s are no longer in York but in Eastern Europe somewhere, Rowntree’s are still here but make all sorts of products under other brand names as well as their own. Don’t worry about the nicknames, once we are settled in it will all calm down. Let’s wade through these files he has left us and see what sparks any interest, you take those two and I’ll take these.”

My two cases were totally different, one was an attack on ‘Lola Luscious’ a local drag performer, and the second an outbreak of what seemed like organised shoplifting in the Jorvik shopping centre. Trudy’s cases were the disappearance of ‘Mick the Mime”, a street entertainer, and a spate of vandalism and offensive graffiti in the Museum Gardens. We decided to start off with an interesting one, ‘Lola Luscious’, and a more routine and uninteresting one, the vandalism and graffiti ,and each of us started to study the notes in more detail.

“Who is ‘Mick the Mime’ anyway and why should we be concerned if has not been seen lately.”

“ Trudy, when you have had a chance to get around the city, you will get to know all the many regular street entertainers, jugglers, fire-eaters, period-dressed actors putting on sketches, as well as the usual musicians and buskers. Most of them are in the black economy, getting donations from the tourists to have their selfies taken with them, some are legitimate, but most are outside the tax system. Some of them are very good and are doing it as a career choice, for others it is a fill-in while they are between jobs or living on welfare payments. The tourists like them, they are seen as part of the city experience, so the police and authorities tend to turn a blind eye as long as they are friendly and not too pushy. ‘Mick the Mime’ is one of the more popular ones, he is a ‘human statue’, heavily made up and dressed, all in stone colours, and just stands unmoving and rigid like a statue, and every now and then suddenly moves quickly and surprises people. He is one of the most popular selfies.”

“It looks like ‘Lola’,real name Michael Metcalf, was attacked when he left the club after the show, he was wearing normal men’s clothes not the outrageous stage costumes and makeup. He did not see the attacker or hear any voices, nothing was stolen, his cheek was deeply slashed a couple of times with a penknife or scalpel, and the attacker then ran off. There appears to be no obvious motives or suspects or witnesses or CCTV images. All the reports refer to ‘Lola’ as he or him, apparently other than when performing or going to and from the shows he dresses and appears as a male. At the moment there are no leads to follow and the case is stuck in limbo.”
I summarised the contents of the file for Trudy.

“It sounds just your type of thing Julie, have you ever seen ‘Lola’ perform.”

“Trudy, before you say anything further that you and I will regret, let’s get one thing straight. As you well know, as near as possible I dress and act like any other woman, I am not, never have been, nor have I ever looked like a drag artist or been particularly interested in drag, other than as a comedy spectacle. However you have a point, maybe it would be a good idea to go and see Lola in one of the shows, and have a talk backstage afterwards. See if you can find the next show date and we will have a visit. What have you found on the vandalism case?”

“The gardens are open to the public early morning until late evening, and out of hours the gates are locked and there is no easy access.The damage seems to happen overnight and is all minor stuff, benches overturned, graffiti sprayed on the walls and even on the grass, flower borders ripped up, that sort of thing, but the old ruined St Mary’s Abbey in the grounds seems to be treated with respect and has been left alone. There is minimal CCTV coverage in the gardens themselves, although the surrounding roads are reasonably well covered, but they are so busy with tourists that it has been difficult to highlight any particular person or activity.”

“Do a bit of internet searching to get familiar with the layout of the gardens and we will go for a visit and walk around in the morning to get a feel for the place.”

Rather than going into the office the next morning we went straight to the adjacent Museum which managed the Gardens and spoke to the manager responsible.

“I know that it is all on file, but please tell us in your own words, how long this has been going on and a bit more on the graffiti please.”

“We have never had a significant problem before, just the normal disruptive teenagers or drunks and litter droppers, the gardens are a haven of tranquility amongst the hustle and bustle of the City centre and are really appreciated and treated with respect. About a month ago we suddenly started getting issues, it started with a few slogans sprayed onto the lawns, mainly along the lines of ‘tourists go home’ and ‘we don’t want you here’, ‘litter louts are not welcome here’ and stuff like that. Then some of the benches were sprayed with non-drying paint and overturned along with little notes saying “go and sit and eat your snacks elsewhere’. We try to keep on top of it, but like everyone else we are short-staffed and it is all an increased workload on our people.”

“ Have you recently had problems with any individuals, members of the public or staff who have reasons to feel angry with you.”

“Not that I can recall, although we have had a few grumbles from some of the gardeners about us cutting back their overtime hours, but I wouldn’t like to think that it was one of them.”

“I believe you have some CCTV, but the files tell me that there are no records of any significant activity. can we have copies of your video records for us to go through just in case something has been missed.”

“ It is all digitally recorded now, rather than on tapes, so I should be easily able to run off a copy for you and send it over.”

“Thanks for your help, we’ll see what we can do. While we are here we might have a wander around the gardens to get a feel for the place and see if the is any of the damage still visible.”

Back at the office, Trudy started looking through the video records, and I looked into when ‘Lola’ was next due an appearance, and phoned up the club telling them that we wanted to ask a few questions regarding the attack.

“Lola was due to be on tonight but is still badly scarred and a bit unsettled, so we have a replacement ‘Hot-lips Houlihan’. However Lola will be here tonight in the audience to cast an eye over the competition, why don’t you come and see the show, you might enjoy it, and we’ll introduce you to Lola.”

Trudy spent most of the afternoon glued to the computer screen looking at irrelevant records from the cameras at the gardens, but there was no sign of suspicious behaviour, but she did find that there were some suspicious gaps in the records, which needed further investigation.

‘“Let’s go home and into our ‘glad-rags’ Trudy, we’re going out on the town tonight. But before you get too excited we’re going to see the drag show and have a chat with ‘Lola’, so don’t go too heavy with the make-up, you don’t want to look like you are part of the show.”

“I don’t think there is any chance of me being mistaken for a Queen, I think that is you that needs to be careful” she replied, giving as good as she had got, “This girl definitely has spirit” I thought.

We rolled up at the club about a half-hour before the show and asked to be taken to meet Lola.
Instead of the outrageously dressed and made-up drag queen we were expecting, we were taken to a young man in his mid-twenties, casually dressed and well-groomed, but from the bright red scars on his left cheek it was obvious that this was the person we wanted to meet.

“ Hi there , I take it that we should call you Michael tonight, I’m DS Julie Rowntree and this is DC Trudy Terry. I must say that you are not as we expected, we were anticipating meeting you in full drag.”

“The glam stuff is just for the stage show, it’s like a uniform, I’m sure you don’t wear your uniform out of duty hours. I’m an actor, looking for a decent break, and this is a role I play, pretty well actually, and the fees are quite good and keep the wolves from the door. Just so you know, I might do drag, but I am not a cross-dresser and neither am I gay, which makes me different from most of the other acts they put on here. Most of the ‘girls’ are gay and some cross-dress in their daily lives, some of them resent me, saying that I am mocking and taking advantage of their lifestyle, but it’s earning me a living. I haven’t worked here since the attack, the wounds are still open a bit and I don’t want to plaster heavy stage make-up on top of them in case it causes an infection.”

“ I know what you mean, I once had a bit of acne and didn’t like using foundation then either. How are you supporting yourself, have you got a daytime job as well?” Trudy chimed in.

“I normally work as a street entertainer as well, but that also involves a lot of heavy make-up, so I am just living off my savings for a while.”

Trudy got there just before me with a really smug look on her face “You are not ‘Mick the Mime’ are you?”

“That’s me too, you’re right, have you seen my act, what do you think of it?”

“I’ve not seen it but Julie tells me that you are very popular and seem to earn quite a bit of money from it. We’ve been looking for you, people have been missing you and wondering where you have got to. At least that is one of our cases we can cross off the list.”

I thought I’d take over again before Trudy delved into his life history, she was obviously taken with him. “Back to the reason we are here, tell us what happened the night you were attacked.”

“ I can’t really help much, I had finished my act, got cleaned up and changed and left for home. Just outside I was suddenly grabbed from behind, my face was slashed, as you can see, and when I turned around my attacker had disappeared. your colleagues tested my clothes and skin for DNA and such like, but didn’t get links to anyone on the system.”

“Did you hear anything, did they say anything, any particular smells, tobacco, body odour, cologne?”

“The only thing I heard was ‘Bitch’, I can’t even tell you whether it was a male or female voice, it wasn’t particularly distinctive. Now you mention it there was quite a flowery scent smell, possibly a heavy after-shave or cologne.”

“If you think of anything no matter if you think it irrelevant, let us know. While we are here the show is just starting, are they any good?”

‘Far be it from me to say so, but ‘Hot-Lips’ is not in my league, there is no real professionalism to the act it is just a lot of posing, pouting and miming to backing tracks, but the punters will applaud anything on stage in a dress.”

Hot-lips came on, went through her routine and Michael was right, it was not particularly good and quite amateurish. After the show was closing, a smartly dressed and made-up young woman in a sleeveless blouse and mid-thigh skirt approached our table.”Hi Lola, did you enjoy the show tonight?” she said in a rather husky lisp.

“ Sit down and join us if you want,” invited Michael, “ would you like a drink. While you are off-stage it doesn’t seem right to call you ‘Hot-Lips’ what is your real name?”

“My proper name is Frank Pierce, but I normally go by the name Margaret Houlihan, both characters from the show and film MASH, you see, clever.”

We sat and talked for a while about the show and her lifestyle and how she drifted into it after playing dress-up with her older sister over the years. “I’m so glad the show went down well tonight. It’s unfortunate what happened to Lola, life’s a bitch sometimes, but it has given me an opportunity and in this business a girl has to take every bit of luck that comes her way, right?” She quickly finished her glass of wine and strutted off. Trudy immediately picked up the glass and put it in a plastic bag which she tied and sealed.

“I want to check something Michael, tell the bar manager I’m not stealing the wine glass, they will get it back. We’ll keep in touch Michael”

Trudy and I left and went to a nearby bar for a drink and a chat. “What’s with taking the glass Trudy.”

“I think that Hot-lips/Margaret/Frank might be our man/woman/whatever. Did you not notice that she held her glass in her left hand, Mick - and I noticed she was now using a more familiar version of his name - was attacked from behind and it was his left cheek that was slashed, probably meaning that the attacker is left-handed. I also picked up that in telling her life story that she frequently referred to people as ‘bitch’, lots of coincidences don’t you think? I would like to get the glass to forensics to see if we have a DNA match.”

“Well picked up Trudy, you are not as daft as you look are you, check it out in the morning, let’s go home.”

No reply from Trudy, just a cheeky smile with her tongue stuck out.

We were back in the Museum with the manager Wednesday morning. “We’ve noticed that there are gaps in the video records, do you have trouble with your system? Do you also have records of the days when the vandalism has occurred?”

“The system does fail occasionally, the security firm puts it down to power spikes or something, you have the copy of the videos so you know when the failures happened. I’ll check the diaries and sort out the vandalism dates, do you think they may tie up together?”

After a quick check it was obvious that the system failures and the vandalism were often occurring at the same time, which suggested that one of the staff was deliberately interfering with the records to cover up their crimes. As we were not sure and did not want to point fingers, we did not tell the manager our suspicions, but requested that they get their security system maintenance company to come in to do a routine service, and asked for their details so that we could discuss improvements with them.

The rest of the day we spend going through the video records again, particularly looking immediately before and after the CCTV system failures, but there were no clear images of anyone in particular approaching the security room, most of the garden staff appeared to go in and out of the building at the times and there was no obvious culprit. We had arranged with the security firm that Trudy would go in with them later that afternoon to arrange a couple of minor modifications to the system during the service, wearing one of their staff sweatshirts and a baseball cap and carrying a tool bag as one of the service team and all went smoothly, and we were ready to wait for results.

Luckily we didn’t have long to wait, that evening there was another spate of vandalism, more graffiti, bins overturned and the normal ‘tourists go home’ type of messages. As expected the CCTV system records were missing for a couple of hours. This time however we had a trick up our sleeves. A concealed camera had been built into the security control panel to get a clear view of whoever went to look at the system. This one transmitted the images directly to the remote monitoring station where it was recorded without showing on the museum display,. We had clear images of one of the gardeners pausing and restarting the recording system and we knew who had being doing the damage.

Thursday morning we were back in the manager’s office interviewing Joe Carmichael one of the gardeners.

“Do you mind telling us why you disabled the CCTV yesterday evening?” I opened the conversation with a blunt statement that I knew would throw him into panic.”

“I don’t know what you are talking about, I’ve done nothing.”

“Joe don’t treat us like idiots, we have film of you tampering with the system to stop recording while you went and damaged the gardens, do you want to start again?”

“ It’s all the boss’s fault, he’s cut back our overtime and it’s a busy time of the year with the tourists, many of them are messy pigs leaving litter all over the place, walking on the flower beds, picking the flowers, we are all rushed off our feet. We were just trying to convince them that we needed the overtime back again, there was no permanent damage just a bit of a mess to clear up. We thought that if we discouraged the visitors, that the bosses would have to do something about it.”

We called in the manager and put him in the picture. “What do you want us to do now, do you want us to go for a prosecution or do you want to deal with it in-house?”

“Joe’s been with us nearly twenty years, and normally he is a good worker, I would not like to see him get a record, can you leave it with us?”

“Joe, this will not go on official record, but we will leave a note on our system. If any of these silly tricks happen again, we will come straight to you, so you better tell whoever you have been working with to stop it all straight away.”

Back in the office Trudy and I finished our reports and filed everything away, that was another case successfully closed. I sent a brief report to CS Scargill, as our line manager, to let him know how we were getting on

We had a visit the next morning from DI Wainwright, he just barged into the office in his normal rude manner, without knocking or even entering slowly and quietly. “I don’t suppose you two have got anywhere with those cases yet, if you want to pass them back to a real detective team you know where my office is.”

“Good morning to you too DI Wainwright, nice to see your happy smiling face again.” I replied with a sweet smile. “It is good of you to call in, it saves me a visit to your office. As a matter of fact, two of the cases are solved and we hope to wrap up a third today, so if you can be kind enough to pull out a few more cases, that you haven’t been able to solve, for next week it may keep us busy for a few days.”

Wainwright stormed out of the office, leaving me with a smug grin and Trudy in a fit of giggles.
“You shouldn’t wind him up like that, his team still support him and we may need his help sometime.”

“The man is a pompous ass, he needs to know that he can’t push us around. Let’s go, I think we deserve a lunch.”

When we got back to the office, there was an email from the forensics team confirming that DNA from ‘Hot Lips’/Margaret/Frank matched that found on Michael’s clothing and we rounded off a successful week by going round to make an arrest. the door was opened by ‘Margaret’ in a casual Gypsy blouse, showing a bit of cleavage and a matching floral swirly skirt and wearing light daytime make-up.

“Frank Piece , we are arresting you on suspicion of aggravated assault on Michael Metcalf, who you knows ‘Lola’, you will be formally read your rights and the full charge down at the station. Would you like to change your clothes and clean off the make-up or do you want to come as you are?”

“ I’ll come as I am, I have nothing to be ashamed of. That bitch Lola deserved what she got, she is only playing at doing drag, for people like me it is a way of life and she is mocking us by doing what she does.”

Down at the station it caused a bit of a stir when Frank was booked in and interviewed, dressed as he was. In fact throughout the interview he insisted on being called Margaret and being addressed as such. We had several interruptions by other detectives, including Wainwright, during the interview on all sorts of pretexts, but mainly so that they could have a gawp at Frank/Margaret, who gave a full confession, was formally charged, and led to the holding cells until he/she could go before magistrates on the next Monday morning.

“I think that was a successful week Trudy. We’ve created a bit of a stir, made a few friends and a few enemies here, and sorted three cases that were being ignored. We’ll leave the shop-lifting case until next week, let’s go celebrate then go home for a quiet weekend and see what next week brings.”

“I’m with you boss, I think ‘The Odd Squad’ is here to stay.”

To be continued.