Law and Peace by Tim Kevan

TopFirst’s fiancée today. She accepted my request for friendship on Facebook and sent the following message:
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    Hi BabyB. Really lovely to hear from you. I don’t know what went on between you and TopFirst but I’m glad that you and I can remain friends, at least. As it happens, I’m actually down your neck of the woods next Thursday. If you’re not in court do you fancy lunch?
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    To which I of course replied simply:
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    Look forward to it. See you there x

Chapter 3
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    D ecember : S candalMonger
    Monday 3 December 2007
    Year 2 (week 10): ScandalMonger
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    BigMouth’s case rumbles on. Slippery wrote immediately to the other side giving them the evidence I had discreetly gathered on RoundTheBlock. This morning they replied, telling him where in particular he could stick his offer. No real surprise there given the bullish stance RedTop have been taking all along. But then Slippery asked to see me in his office this afternoon.
    As we sat down he said, ‘I need to have a serious talk, BabyB.’
    â€˜Of course,’ I replied, a little nervously, wondering what on earth I had done wrong.
    â€˜You and I haven’t worked together much in the past but it seems our paths are woven together at least for the foreseeable future, what with BigMouth’s case and then TheMoldies.’
    â€˜Yes, I can’t pretend the thought hadn’t been worrying me, given what a lowlife, scum sucking, slime bucket we all know that you are.’ Thankfully those thoughts didn’t come out and I managed a diplomatic ‘I guess so’.
    â€˜Well, I think now’s probably a good time to explain a few home truths about how we work.’
    Oh, here we go, I thought. You should be lucky for the work and all that. I’m in charge and you’d better not forget it. But instead he continued with, ‘Actually, there’s just one particular issue at this stage and it concerns bringing in a little outside, er, help for both of our cases.’
    â€˜Like an expert witness?’ I asked innocently.
    â€˜Exactly, BabyB. Just like an expert witness.’ He paused. ‘Though he’s not a witness.’
    â€˜And don’t tell me – he’s not an expert either?’ I smiled.
    â€˜Well, not in the traditional sense, at least.’
    â€˜OK,’ I said hesitatingly, ‘you’d better tell me a little more.’
    â€˜Better still,’ he said, ‘I’d like to introduce you.’ He then picked up the phone and asked his secretary to bring his other guest in.
    I was slightly taken aback at having someone else foisted into the mix but I tried not to show it. We both stood up as an odd-looking tall man in a brown suit with a mop of wavy brown hair and thick NHS glasses walked in. But above all, what hit me most was his disproportionately large hands, which seemed to be fizzing with energy down to the tips of his fingers.
    Slippery introduced him as a man I shall call ScandalMonger and as he went to shake my hand all I could think of were those huge hands that football fans hold aloft at matches. I gathered that he is one of those types whose day job is to buy and sell stories. Not any old stories, just those involving human misery in one form or another. If the misery isn’t in the story itself then it follows pretty soon afterwards. He is the kind of man who believes he can bring down anything from political parties, to star strikers, to the best that middle England has to offer: a larger than life impresario who’s so much of a fraud that he even believes his own lies. All in all, he is a horrible creature who would make even TopFirst seem like a modest sort of fellow. Well, that’s what I took from Slippery’s flattering thumbnail sketch anyway.
    â€˜So how will all this help our cases?’ I asked.
    â€˜Well, BabyB, that’s not all he does. What with all these clients, investigators and press