Cracker: Best Boys

Fitz, Penhaligon and the other officers at Anson Road C.I.D. attend Jimmy Beck’s funeral. Fitz meets Beck’s sister who asks him how her brother had gone so badly wrong. It turns out that Beck had talked about Fitz constantly when he rang home and his sister wanted to put a face to a “friend”. Penhaligon causes a scene at the wake when she gets very drunk. Fitz calls her a taxi and turns down her offer to go back to her house and sleep with her. Bill Preece/Nash, a 17 year old boy who is living in a children’s care home, breaks into the factory where he is doing work experience and is found by the foreman, Stuart Grady. There is an unspoken but palpable chemistry between the two and Grady lets Bill sleep on the floor in his flat. When Grady’s landlady, Mrs. Franklin finds Bill in the flat the next morning, she assumes that he is a rent boy and threatens to call the police. Grady is so distressed that Bill stabs Mrs. Franklin to stop Grady from being unhappy. She is only wounded and Grady has to deliver the fatal blow to prevent his friend from going to prison. Before they can leave the flat, Mr. Franklin comes home and finds his dying wife in the cellar trying to get out. He falls down into the cellar with her where he is later found by the police and charged with his wife’s murder. Grady is questioned by DC Alan Temple and tells him that Bill is his son. Fitz concludes that Mr. Franklin does not have the courage or strength to commit murder and that they are looking for two killers. However, he mistakenly assumes that it is a man and a woman team. Fitz’s home life is still extremely torrid since Judith seems to be going through postnatal depression following the birth of their son. She is also being increasingly drawn to Fitz’s brother as a source of comfort.