Donna put her hands to her ears and said loudly, ‘I can’t believe this is happening!’ She turned to face Frank Laughton. ‘You come into my home - my home! - and try to tell me my husband is a criminal, and then you have the audacity to stand there and harangue my housekeeper! You call my husband a blagger? Well, Mr Laughton, you had better prove your allegations or I will see to it that you pay for this night’s work. Now do what the hell you have to then get out of my home. Do you hear me? Get out of my home!’

Dolly pulled the distraught woman into her arms, glaring at the policemen as they trooped out of the kitchen.

‘Oh Dolly, what’s going on? What on earth is going on? There’s obviously been some kind of mistake. They won’t even let me go and see Georgio.’

‘It’s all a big mistake, darlin’. Before you know it, everything will be sorted out and back to normal. Look on the bright side, love. It got rid of that load of ponces, eh?’

Donna smiled wanly. ‘Oh, Dolly. I don’t know what to do.’ Her voice was thick with tears.

Dolly held her close. She could smell the expensive shampoo Donna always used.

‘I’ll pour you out a strong cup of tea. This’ll all be over before you know it.’

Five minutes later they sat and listened as the house was systematically torn apart around them.

Detective Laughton was smiling widely. He was known as ‘Arsehole Laughton’ by criminals and his own men alike. He wasn’t what would be termed a well-liked man and he knew this; accepted it. Revelled in it, in fact. He prided himself that his men might not love him, but at least they respected him. It would have pained him to know that, in reality, the men he worked with had more respect for the majority of the criminals they captured than for their Guv’nor.

Lighting one of the eighty cigarettes he smoked a day, Laughton coughed loudly, a phlegm-ridden, hacking cough that made the young DC’s insides rise up in protest.

‘Cigarette, Mr Brunos?’ Laughton’s face screwed up as he fought to hold back another wracking bout.

Georgio shook his head in distaste.

Laughton let the cough go, spraying Georgio and the younger man with spittle and mucus.

‘Leave it out, for fuck’s sake!’ Georgio Brunos was disgusted and it showed in his face.

‘Oh, what’s the matter, Mr Brunos? Are we too, too sophisticated for all this, eh?’ Laughton’s voice was sarcastic and hard. ‘Does living the life of fucking Riley in a big drum, with flash cars and plenty of booze and skirt, make you better than everyone else then?’