Before midday, Elgood suggested they ate. Talk had sputtered out, they needed something to do. There was cold chicken and salad and white wine. They ate little, drank a lot. He didn’t set out to get her drunk, he prided himself he had never needed that, and he stopped topping up her glass while she was still well this side of inebriety. But she was more relaxed than she had been since arriving. There was still tension there, he felt as he took her in his arms, but it was the tension of resolve, the nervous novice knowing she can do her duty.
They made love. It hadn’t been great but it had been promising. There was a deep sensuality there waiting to be tapped, and afterwards they drank brandy together, she chattering away in the reaction of release, he content to wait quietly for his strength to return so that he could really sample the goods he had just begun to unwrap.
Outside a wind had blown up off the sea. A rambling rose, sadly neglected and full of insect life, grew up the side wall of the cottage and the strong gusts set it tapping against the window. Daphne stopped talking and let out a startled little cry.
‘What’s up?’ asked Elgood.
‘Nothing. Just the noise,’ she said tremulously. ‘For a moment I thought it might be Patrick!’
‘Disguised as a rose-bush? Aye, that’d be just about what I’d expect,’ mocked Elgood.
‘Why do you say that?’
‘Well, he’s a bit obsessed, isn’t he? He’s got more rose catalogues than company records in his filing cabinet, so they say.’
He hadn’t meant to start talking about Patrick again. Absent husbands held a very low place in his list of postcoital topics.
‘Obsessed? No, I don’t think that’s the word,’ said Daphne, frowning. ‘He loves his garden and he loves the house, but I don’t think he’d ever put them before the children, or before me either.’
Elgood didn’t like the way the conversation was turning.
He said, ‘But surely the way he’s poured all the money you’ve ever had into Rosemont …’
‘And us, too,’ corrected Daphne. ‘Neither the children nor I have ever wanted for anything. So it’s not obsessive, it’s just rather uncanny, this certainty of his that everything will be all right, that nothing will ever be allowed to threaten Rosemont …’
‘Uncanny, then,’ said Elgood, feeling himself almost ready for the second course, and wanting to be shot of this unseemly topic. ‘All right, he’s got magical powers protecting his fairy castle. Another drop of brandy, love?’
‘No, thanks. Yes, it does sometimes seem like that, doesn’t it? I mean, he’s always said “don’t worry,” and I’ve always worried, and yet he’s always turned out to be right. Obstacles just seem to get out of his way. I mean, four years ago he hadn’t even got a job after he finished with Capstick’s and look where he is now without hardly any effort. It’s hardly surprising he can still be so sure of getting on the Board, even though you say not, is it?’
There was no guile in her tone, nothing but an honest desire to understand her husband, yet Elgood felt it not only as an atmospheric intrusion, but as a threat. For some reason the memory of the desk lamp came into his mind. He caressed Daphne’s breast, massaging the nipple between finger and thumb, but the gesture did as little for him as it seemed to be doing for her and when a little while later she said she ought to be getting ready to leave now if she were to be in time to pick up her daughter from school, he made no protest.
He had dropped her back at the car-park entrance, driven back to the office, sat and looked at the desk lamp, finally laughed at his foolishness and got down to some work. Later he had driven to his flat and put the car in the garage without any difficulty. He had passed a rather restless night, full of menacing dreams in which Bulmer and Eagles figured large. But a good breakfast had seemed to put him right.
Then he had descended to his garage, tugged at the up-and-over door which could normally be moved by a little finger’s pressure, jerked at it when it appeared to be stuck, and next moment was flinging himself backwards as the whole heavy structure came crashing down.
Well, perhaps he had overreacted. But it was understandable. And all was well that ended well. He was back in charge now. Indeed things were so normal that he found himself inwardly assessing the chances of persuading Daphne to have one for the road.
Down boy! he warned himself. That was the way to trouble. And in any case, he doubted if she were the type. Her next words confirmed this.
‘I’m not really cut out for this kind of thing,’ she said. ‘I had to see you face to face to make sure you understood. It’s just not my cup of tea. I was in real agony when the police came round to ask questions about my car. I kept on remembering those boys hanging around the car park and wondering if they’d remember seeing me there.’
‘Like I told you when you rang,’ said Elgood easily, ‘they likely didn’t even notice. And if they were the ones as did the scratching, they’re not going to volunteer to chat with the cops, are they? In any case, it was just a bit of vandalization, hardly the crime of the century!’
‘But they did send that ugly CID man round to see me,’ objected Daphne.
Elgood couldn’t contradict this except by telling her what he imagined the real reason for this visit had been. That was an embarrassment he was glad to be able to avoid.
‘That’s true. Time on their hands, these bobbies,’ he said. ‘Have you time for another coffee? Or a drink, mebbe?’
As hoped, this provoked her to shake her head and rise.
‘No, really. I must be getting back.’
‘Right,’ he said. ‘Still friends?’
‘Of course.’
He kissed her lightly on the cheek.
She smiled and said, ‘It’s silly, but I feel so happy I’ve seen you and made things clear. It’s like coming out of the dentist’s.’
‘I’ve been called a lot of things,’ he said, ‘but rarely a dentist.’
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean … it’s just that I let things get inside my mind sometimes and rattle round in there and worry myself into the most absurd ideas! You know, just recently I met this woman, purely by chance, and it turned out she was a policeman’s wife. I like her a lot, she’s bright and straightforward, and completely independent, of her husband I mean. And yet the other night I woke up at four A.M. suddenly completely convinced she’d been set on me to spy for the police force! I hate those four o’clock horrors, don’t you? That’s another thing about Patrick, he never has them. Of course, came the dawn, and I could see what a fool I’d been. But that’s the way I’ve been going on lately, like some neurotic!’
This burst of relieved chatter had got them out of the cottage.
‘Have you mentioned your new friend to Patrick?’ asked Elgood casually as he opened the car door.
‘Oh yes. The other night. I didn’t know how he’d react, especially as when I met her she was protesting against the school that Diana goes to. But you know Patrick. Nothing bothers him. He just suggested I should invite her and her husband round for dinner one night.’
‘I’d be careful about inviting the fuzz into my house,’ said Elgood only half jokingly. ‘What did you say her name was?’
Daphne told him.
To her horror, Elgood put his hands to his face and leaned against the car with a long, low groan.
‘What’s the matter?’ she cried in alarm. Most of her alarm was for Elgood who she feared was having a heart-attack. But there was a little bit left over for herself as her mind raced ahead to the possible consequences.
She put her arm round his shoulders. He moved his hands away from his face, revealing to her relief and also her puzzlement the pains not of disease but of simple dismay.
‘What’s the matter, Dick?’ she demanded. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I wish I knew,’ he said.
He looked at her for a couple of seconds, sighed, took her hand in his and said, ‘You’d best come back into the cottage. I’ve got something to tell you. But
first of all, you’d better tell me everything you know about this Mrs Ellie Pascoe.’
2
MEMORIAM
(Hybrid Tea. Dates from 1960, – white bedding rose, sad in the rain.)
Wednesday for Pascoe started with the dead.
Tuesday had finished with Dalziel. Pascoe wasn’t sure which he preferred.
The fat man had rung shortly after five o’clock. He had listened in silence to Pascoe’s description of his interrogation of the two boys. His reaction to the news about Elgood and Daphne Aldermann was almost dismissive.
‘It doesn’t surprise me,’ he said. ‘If they put him into intensive care, he’d likely ask for a double-bed. Gives Aldermann a good motive, though. And it begins to make it a bit clearer why Dick got so bloody neurotic about Aldermann.’
‘Well, it surprised me,’ said Pascoe. ‘Ellie’s got to know Daphne Aldermann quite well and she doesn’t sound the type for a quick hump. You don’t think it could be serious between her and Elgood, could it? That might explain a few things.’
‘If it is, then Dick doesn’t know about it,’ said Dalziel emphatically. ‘Elgood’s only serious about himself. He got frightened for some reason and he wanted reassurance, about the desk-lamp, and about the garage door, and about them two fellows that died. He couldn’t go through the coroners’ reports himself, could he? Is your missus seeing the Aldermann woman again? She’s a sharp lass, your Ellie, even if she does get some daft notions sometimes. Ask her to see what she can winkle out.’
‘I believe they’ll be having coffee together in the morning,’ said Pascoe. ‘But I don’t think Ellie would take kindly to being asked to winkle things out.’
‘Why not?’ asked Dalziel with audible bewilderment.
‘I’m sure if you asked her, she’d be happy to explain the moral position to you, sir,’ said Pascoe firmly.
‘The moral position? I thought that was when a lass did it on her back, in the dark, with her eyes closed,’ said Dalziel. ‘You’ll be seeing Elgood again, I suppose?’
‘Yes. I rang his office today but he’s down at the seaside again, God knows who with this time. His secretary said he has a very busy schedule tomorrow, and would Thursday do. I didn’t want to sound too urgent so I said OK.’
‘Aye, you’re right to watch how you go with Dick. Fornication’s no crime, remember that.’
‘Wasting police time is,’ said Pascoe.
‘You still think it’s a waste of time?’ said Dalziel. ‘Well, you may be right. Here’s something else to waste your time on then. Another corpse in Aldermann’s track. Penny Highsmith mentioned him. Someone who nearly bought Rosemont. Mid-sixties it’d be, after Patrick had done his “O” levels. Edgar Masson was the old lady’s solicitor so likely he’d still have been acting for the family, so he should have all the details. Even if he hasn’t, that old bugger knows more about other people’s business than most other people.’
Pascoe said, ‘Is there anything more?’ scribbling wildly.
‘Aye. Ask him about the will. I went round to Somerset House today. There was some Kraut here talking about fighting the subversive war. What do them buggers know about fighting wars? They can’t remember the last time they won one! So I ducked out. At Somerset House I found out that she died intestate, Auntie Flo.’
‘Then there wasn’t a will,’ said Pascoe smartly.
‘I know what intestate means,’ said Dalziel heavily. ‘I also know that Edgar Masson’s not in the habit of letting rich clients get away without paying him for drawing up a will. At some stage, there’d have been one. And talking of wills, after what you told me that accountant fellow, Capstick, said about the Reverend Somerton’s accounts being in his office, I thought I might as well take a look at the Rev’s will while I was at Somerset House. He had £60,000 to leave, right enough, but he only left £20,000 of it to his daughter. The rest was spread around various good causes, so if Aldermann was expecting riches, he was disappointed!’
‘Twenty thou was still a lot of money in 1971,’ said Pascoe.
‘Sixty thou was near on a fortune,’ said Dalziel. ‘I’d best be on my way now. There’s a seminar going off on the policewoman’s role in multi-racial contra-social interaction or something.’
‘And you don’t want to miss it?’ said Pascoe with cautious incredulity.
‘Don’t be bloody daft!’ sneered Dalziel. ‘It’ll be over soon and I’m using the bugger’s phone who’s chairing it. Suspicious bastard even keeps his whisky locked!’
Pascoe may have only imagined he heard the splintering of wood before he replaced the phone, but such imaginings in Dalziel’s regard were as likely to be hypotheses as fantasies.
He shared the conversation with Wield over a cup of coffee the following morning.
‘It was probably the Commissioner’s office,’ he concluded. ‘He’s getting worse as he gets older. And it’s getting hard to know where you are with him. Before he went, he told us he didn’t want us wasting time on this Aldermann business. Now he seems full of it. Why?’
‘He’s renewed his acquaintance with Mrs Highsmith,’ said Wield significantly, dipping a chocolate-coated digestive into his cup.
‘I can’t imagine what you mean,’ said Pascoe primly. ‘That chocolate’s melting.’
‘It’s the heat. It does that sometimes,’ explained Wield. ‘He’ll be seeing her again?’
‘He implied it,’ said Pascoe. ‘You know, you could achieve the same effect by eating plain biscuits and drinking mocha coffee.’
‘It’s a different kind of multi-racial contra-social interaction,’ said Wield solemnly. ‘Does this mean Mr Dalziel now reckons there’s something in all this for us officially?’
Pascoe gestured at his desk which was covered with the stationery of death. Police reports, medical reports, coroners’ reports.
‘The thing about our modern society,’ he mused, ‘is that no one passes without leaving a mark any more. If there is anything for us in all this, it ought to be somewhere in all these. Let’s try to put things in some kind of order, shall we?’
‘Chronological, you mean?’
‘There are other kinds of order,’ said Pascoe kindly. ‘But that’ll do for starters. Here we go. 1960. Mrs Florence Aldermann dies of a coronary thrombosis. Medical report is unambiguous. She was still convalescent from an earlier attack. And there are no suspicious circumstances unless we count the intestacy which meant that Penny Highsmith got the entire estate. Now we jump on a decade to the Reverend Oliver Somerton. Skull fractured by a piece of masonry fallen from the belfry of St Mark’s Church, Little Leven.’
‘Hold on,’ said Wield. ‘There’ll be at least one other in between. This fellow Mr Dalziel mentioned, the one who wanted to buy the house but died.’
‘Oh yes. I sincerely hope he’ll turn out to have died of old age a hundred miles away,’ said Pascoe. ‘I’m seeing the solicitor, Masson, later this morning.’
‘I’ll pencil in a query,’ said Wield.
‘Right. Back to the Rev. Suspicious circumstances? All unwitnessed accidents are, ipso facto, suspicious. But there were no pointers to anything definite, and the coroner seemed quite satisfied.’
‘Act of God,’ said Wield.
‘Watch it,’ said Pascoe. ‘We need all the help we can get. Anyway, that was ’seventy-one. On to ’seventy-six. Mrs Catherine McNeil. Died of bronchial pneumonia which developed after a burst of some particularly virulent influenza. Was that one of the years when there was a lot of it about, Chinese, Siamese, Patagonian or something?’
‘I’ll try to check,’ said Wield. ‘How old was she?’
‘Seventy-eight.’
‘At seventy-eight there’s always a lot of it about,’ said the sergeant. ‘She’s the one Aldermann had been robbing and who left him the money?’
‘That’s her. Aldermann had ’flu himself, I gather. It was during his absence from the office that his little games with Mrs McNeil’s money came to light.’
&n
bsp; ‘So he sneezed at her till she got a fatal dose of germs?’ said Wield.
Pascoe glared at him.
‘Let’s leave the debunking jokes to Mr Dalziel, shall we?’ he said.
‘Just rehearsing, sir,’ murmured Wield and the two men grinned at each other.
‘That was at the beginning of ’seventy-six. Three and a half years later in September ’seventy-nine, Christopher Burke dies, the first of three casualties at Perfecta where Aldermann had started working on a part-time basis some six months earlier.’
‘Burke was the one who fell off a ladder while he was painting his house?’
‘That’s what I thought,’ said Pascoe. ‘But the coroner’s report says that in fact he’d got a firm in to do the work. That morning they’d been replacing a section of guttering prior to painting the eaves. Burke, it is surmised, ran up the ladder when he came home from work to inspect the repair, it slipped and he broke his neck.’
‘Witnesses?’
‘None,’ said Pascoe, looking at the report. ‘He died between two-thirty and three-thirty. His wife went out at two-thirty and he wasn’t home then. She came back an hour later and there he was, spread out across the patio at the back of the house.’
‘What about the decorators?’ wondered Wield.
‘After they’d got the new bit of guttering in, it started raining, so they waited a while and when the weather showed no sign of improving, they went off to an inside job they were doing as well. You know what painters are like.’
‘Strange,’ said Wield.
‘Painters?’
‘No. That a man would go up a ladder in the wet. Straight from the office.’
‘I thought so too. But it was showery, it seems. Theory is that he arrived home in a dry patch, was surprised not to see the decorators at work, ran up the ladder just to check how much – or how little – they’d done, and that was that.’
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