Giovedì, 15 Aprile, 2004 | Posted by Detective Stevens at 22:21

It was one of those nights you should really stay indoors, beside a fire, slippers on your feet, a warm cup of cocoa beside you and a woman who's giving you bedroom eyes even before the evening news.

God, that sounds like Chandler, only worse.

Yes, I was a Detective Inspector, but unfortunately I didn't have a fire. The air smelt like a whore's breath in June.

It was cool and sticky and thick under your collar. The odour of too many cigarettes for dinner and sailors for dessert.

As if trying to clear the air, the sky started to rain. More to the point it started to pour.

And it poured on a dead man. The reason why we happen to be here.

His head smashed into the drain, the rest of his body sticking out, water circling around him, pushing its way through, trying to escape the scene of the crime by running away down the drain.

Had it been dry, he may have looked like a man who'd lost a tennis ball and inocently thought it may have disappeared down the drain.

As the rain pounds against your face you quickly ralise this is not the night to go looking for anything; not tennis balls, not friends, not love, not dancers.

I pulled out a cigarette. It was an automatic reaction of mine on such occasions. It was raining too hard to light. Thank goodness. It was my third week without one.

I had promised I would only smoke on rainy days or first thing in the morning - in the shower. I looked back at the drain man, and that's when I noticed it. I turned to my partner and said pointing over at drain man, "Look, dead men do wear plaid."

He didn't laugh. "That's bad" he said. I hoped he was referring to drain man. "Third bad one this month." I still hoped he was referring to drain man. "Another gangland hit." Phew, he was. "Well, it's either that or he heard one of your jokes."

I pretended I didn't hear. We both stood there. In the rain. I thought of having another cigarette when I saw it.

"Jesus" I said.

"Christ" he added.

"That's not the Jesus I am talking about."