of course, we can't talk about it in here."
Carol's smile lit up her eyes.
"You can have no idea how much pleasure that gives me."
They ate in silence for a few minutes. Tony broke the silence. That way, he stayed in control of the subject.
"What made you decide to be a copper?"
Carol raised her eyebrows.
"Because I like oppressing the underprivileged and hassling racial minorities?" she tried.
Tony smiled.
"I don't think so."
She pushed her plate to one side and sighed.
"Youthful idealism she said.
"I had this crazy idea that the police should be there to serve and protect society from lawlessness and anarchy."
"It's not such a crazy idea. Believe me, if you dealt with the people I used to handle, you'd feel relieved that they weren't on the streets."
"Oh, the theory's fine. It's just the practice that's such a bummer.
It all started when I read sociology at Manchester. I specialized in the sociology of organizations, and all my contemporaries despised the police force as a corrupt, racist, sexist organization whose sole role was to preserve the illusory comfort of the middle classes. To some extent, I agreed with them. The difference was that they wanted to attack institutions from the outside, whereas I've always believed that if you want fundamental change, it has to come from inside. "
Tony grinned.
"You little subversive, you!"
"Yeah, well, I guess I didn't realize what I was getting into. David knocking out Goliath was a piece of piss compared with trying to change things in the police."
"Tell me about it," Tony said with feeling.
"This national task force could revolutionize the clear-up rate on serious crimes, but the way some senior officers carry on, you'd think I was setting up a scheme to allow paedophiles to retrain as child minders."
Carol giggled.
"You mean, you'd rather be back in the locked ward with your nutters?"
"Carol, sometimes I feel like I've never left. You've no idea what a refreshing change it is to work with people like you and John Brandon."
Before Carol could reply, the waiter arrived with their main courses.
As she spooned out lamb and spinach, chicken karahi and pilau rice, Carol said,
"Does your job create the same problems with having a private life as the police service does?"
Instantly defensive. Tony answered with a question. "How do you mean?"
"Like you said earlier, you get obsessed with the J0^- You spend your time dealing with shit heads and animals ' " And that's just your colleagues," Tony butted in.
"Yeah, right. And you come home at night after dealing with broken bodies and fractured lives and you're expected to sit down and watch the soaps and act like normal people do."
"And you can't because your head's still plugged '" to the horrors of the day," Tony finished.
"And with your job, you have the added complication of shift work."
"Exactly. So, do you get the same problems?"
Was she asking out of idle curiosity or was this an oblique way of finding out about his private life? Sometimes Tony wished he could just switch off the part of his head that had to analyse every statement, every gesture, every intricate piece of body language and just revel in the pleasure of eating dinner with someone who seemed to enjoy his company. Suddenly aware that he had left too long a pause between the question and the answer. Tony said,
"I'm probably even worse at switching off than you. Men generally seem to get much more obsessive than women. I mean, how many female train spotters, stamp collectors or football fanatics do you know?"
"And that interferes in your personal relationships?" Carol persisted.
"Well, none of them have ever gone the distance," Tony said, struggling to keep his voice light.
"I don't know if that's down to the job, or to me. Mostly, the last thing they've screamed at me as they walked out the door hasn't been, " you and your bloody nutters", so I guess it must be me. how about you? Ho^ ^y you handle the problems of the job?" ^ < ^ f Carol'^forltcfflP^^^^p^urney to her mouth and she chewed of curry before she answered.
"I've found that men aren't very sympathetic towards shifts unless they do them too. You know, you're never there with the tea on the table when they've got to rush out to that vital squash match.
Add to that the difficulty of getting them to understand why the job drives you inside your head and what are you left with? Junior doctors, other coppers, fire fighters, ambulance drivers. And in my experience, there aren't many of