Part 2: Tuesday: Giving Chase

Sally Donovan decided to put her lunch hour to good use. After making sure that Greg wouldn't be needing anything from her for a while (he was in deep conference with the prosecutor for the Amberley case, trying to figure out how to get the jury to convict without calling Sherlock Holmes to give evidence), she left New Scotland Yard to nip over to the nearest farmers' market. It was too early in the week to buy Molly Hooper's strawberries (unless she wanted them to be all manky and horrible by the time she gave them to Greg, which would defeat the point and send it crying for its mother), but she could at least arrange for a box to be delivered on Friday morning, or to be made ready for pickup, if it turned out that people didn't deliver small, single boxes of fruit.

It was, she thought, an altogether sound plan, and she'd stick Anderson for half of whatever a decent amount of strawberries cost at this time of year.

Though because it was this time of year, strawberries were proving to be difficult to find. Sally hadn't expected them to be present in glorious red-with-little-pips profusion, but neither had she expected there to be a dearth of strawberries. An absence. An utter lack. She was about to write it off as a loss and head back to work when a likely looking smudge of red caught her eye.

And, yes, there they were, a small crate of fruit at the corner of the stall she'd just hurried past. They looked like they'd do the trick. In fact, they looked very good indeed, and they continued to look good even as Sally drew closer to ask about the possibility of there being more of the same on Friday. She even began to entertain the thought of getting some for herself, and maybe taking some home to her flatmate as a sort of apology for all the times she'd had to skip her turn to make dinner.

"My purse!"

Sally blinked. There were just some things you couldn't ignore when you were a copper. The instinct was hardwired into your system somewhere along the way, and she could no more have disregarded "My purse!" in that alarmed and distressed tone than she could have walked away from a cry of "Help!", "Police!", or "Murder!" Especially since it was followed by a shrieked "Stop, thief!"

She gave the strawberries one last, longing look, and gave chase.

Fortunately, the purse snatcher was an idiot. If he'd had half a brain, he would have realized that running like that, still holding the bag and looking over his shoulder every so often, only made him more conspicuous. (Sally could have taught him a thing or two about getting away with theft, but that wouldn't have been helpful to society, and it would have dredged up that part of her teenage years that only Greg knew about, and only because they'd needed to break into a house quietly to stop a murder from happening.)

Fortunately, the Metropolitan Police Service dress code said that footwear should be strong, serviceable, and fit for the purpose, and, as far as Sally Donovan was concerned, part of that purpose was being able to run.

She caught up with the man as he was about to attempt crossing a busy street to get away from her, and tackled him to the kerb to keep him from getting run over by a bright yellow Ford Fiesta. He was still shouting about police brutality when two constables walking their beat came to help her.

It took the rest of the afternoon to charge the thief, point out that she'd actually saved his life, thank you very much, return the purse to its frantic owner, and explain to an incredulous Greg Lestrade just why she'd gotten tied up in something involving personal theft. To make up for it, she called her flatmate to say that she wouldn't be home for dinner, and spent most of the evening helping the D.I. wade through the Amberley case file. She had no time to do anything more about strawberries other than think about them wistfully.