‘Sarge? Did you hear me? You’ll be down to fifty metres at the end of this arc. Maybe more.’
She cleared her throat. ‘Did you eat all the banana bread?’
‘Eh?’
That morning before work she’d baked banana bread for the team. It wasn’t the sort of thing she usually did. She was the boss but she’d never been mumsy with them – she was the second youngest, only Wellard was younger. And it wasn’t because she loved cooking either. They’d had a bad, bad time recently: one of them was on compassionate leave and probably wouldn’t be back after what he’d gone through earlier that week. And then there’d been her foul moods, too: a nightmare to live with for the last two years. She had to give them something in return every now and then.
‘We ate it. But, Sarge, some of those pockets are way over fifty deep. We’re supposed to get one of those maniac techie divers in to do something like this.’
‘Whose side are you on, Wellard? Ours or the HSE’s?’
Silence. Or, rather, the sound of Wellard’s silent grumbling. When it came to being an old woman Wellard had the whole team beat hands down. ‘OK. But if you’re going to do it I’m turning this voice panel down. The whole quarry can hear you and we’ve got a viewing gallery today.’
‘Who?’
‘There’s a traffic unit cruised by to get a look, sitting up there on the grout dunes. Think they’re having their coffee.’
‘I don’t suppose the audience includes that tit of a search adviser, does it?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Nice,’ she said, sarcastic now. ‘Just, it’s sometimes considered etiquette for the search adviser to get his arse out of bed when he’s hauled a team out like this.’
She slowed. In the darkening water ahead a net was slung across her path. Beyond it was the fifty-metre section, where the water was darker and bluer. Colder. It was such uncertain territory that the company had rigged up netting to prevent access to the recreational divers who sometimes used the quarry for practice. She gripped the net, clicked on her divelight and shone it through to where the quarry floor dropped precipitously away.