He said, ‘Thank you. She’s … unconscious.’
He found he couldn’t say in a coma.
‘Best thing,’ said Dalziel with a Harley Street certainty. ‘Time out to build up strength. Pete, listen, owt I can do, owt at all…’
Again, no conventional offer of help, this. Pascoe guessed that if he hinted the hospital wasn’t doing enough, the Chief Executive would find himself in an interview room, being made an offer he couldn’t refuse.
‘That’s good of you,’ he said. ‘Was there some special reason you were ringing, sir?’
‘No, nowt. Well, in fact we’ve got someone in the frame. I’m on my way to Danby now. Likely it’ll be nowt. Listen, Pete, forget the job … well, no need to tell you that. But is there owt you were doing that I should know about and no other bugger can tell me?’
‘Don’t think so,’ said Pascoe. ‘Nobby Clark can fill you in on … oh, hang on, I’ve made an appointment to see Jeannie Plowright at Social Services at nine tomorrow morning. It’s about Mrs Lightfoot, the grandmother. There’s stories about Benny being seen, Clark’s got details, and I thought the old lady’s the only person he’d want to make contact with, if she’s alive, which I doubt, and if he’s here, which I doubt even more. Straw clutching. Probably simplest to cancel it, if you’ve got a better straw to clutch.’
‘No, we’ll leave it till I see how things are looking. Pete, I’ll be in touch. Remember, owt I can do. Luv to Ellie. Tell her …’
For once the Dalziel word-hoard seemed to be empty.
‘Yes,’ said Pascoe. ‘I’ll tell her.’
He stood for a moment, reluctant to move, as if the clocks had stopped and his movement would start them ticking again. A nurse passed him, paused, looked back and said, ‘Excuse me, sir, no mobiles in here. They can set up interference.’
‘Interference?’ said Pascoe. ‘Yes. Of course. Sorry.’
He went back into the waiting room and put his arm round Ellie’s shoulders.
‘Andy sends his best. He says she’ll be OK.’
‘He does? Oh, good. That’s it then. Let’s all go home.’
‘Come on,’ he chided. ‘Who’d you rather have being optimistic? The Pope or Fat Andy?’
She managed the ghost of a smile and said, ‘Point taken.’
‘There’s a coffee machine on the next floor, look, it says so here. Let’s head down there and treat ourselves.’
‘Suppose something happens …’
‘It’ll only take a minute. Better than sitting here… anything’s better … Everything’s going to be fine, love. Uncle Andy’s promised, remember?’
The door opened. A woman came in. They knew her name was Curtis. She was the paediatric consultant.
She came straight to the point.
‘She’s very ill. I’m afraid we can now confirm it’s meningitis.’
‘What kind?’ demanded Eilie.
‘Bacterial.’
The worst kind. Even if he hadn’t known that, Pascoe could have guessed from Ellie’s expression.
He put his arm round her, but she twisted away. She was looking for someone to hit out at just as he had been with the chief executive and the security man.
He said, ‘Ellie.’
She turned on him and yelled: ‘What price Uncle Andy now, eh? What price the fat bastard now?’
FIFTEEN
Edgar Wield was feeling quite pleased with himself. He’d got the search under way at Bixford and transported Geordie Turnbull to Danby without so far attracting the attention of any of the flock of carrion crows who called themselves reporters. Downside was that Turnbull’s solicitor was also here, closeted in the station’s one small interview room with his client.
Then Nobby Clark arrived and told him about Pascoe.
No details. Just that Rosie was in hospital. Wield felt sick. The Pascoes were special to him, the nearest thing to family left for him in this country since his sister emigrated. Edwin … Edwin was different. Closer, yes. But more important? No; just differently so. He looked at the phone. He could ring up and find out what had happened. But he hesitated. He tried to work out why. Fear at what he might hear? That certainly. But something more… He probed, and was bewildered to find something that looked like guilt. For what? Was he mean-spirited enough to resent this intrusion on his new-found personal happiness? That would be cause enough to make him feel guilty. He hoped to God it wasn’t. But if not that, what? He probed deeper, saw more clearly, still didn’t believe it. Then had to. He felt responsible. It was an extension of his feelings about this lost child case. Some cynical, self-despising element at the centre of his psyche did not believe he was meant for happiness and was therefore sure that whatever he got of it could only be procured by subtraction from someone else’s store. It was an absurdity, an egotism in its way as disgusting as selfish vanity. But he still hesitated to pick up the phone. It was as if by doing so he would acknowledge creating whatever monstrous news awaited his enquiry.
‘Super’s just driven into the yard,’ said Clark, coming into the office and anxiously checking out his appearance in the glass-fronted photo of the Queen.
Fear of Dalziel was a healthy condition, but belief that he was appeasable by gleaming brass, polished boots, or any other kind of bullshit meant that you had more than average cause to be afraid, thought Wield, glad of the diversion.
He went out to the yard and saw the Fat Man sitting in his car as if reluctant to get out. The sergeant approached and opened the door like a commissionaire.
‘How do, sir,’ he said. ‘Got some bad news. Clark says the DCI’s…’
‘I’ve spoken to him. They reckon it could be meningitis. She’s in a coma.’
There it was. The worst. No, not quite the worst. That still lay ahead … perhaps awaiting his phone call…
He said, ‘Oh, shit.’
‘Aye, that about sums it up. Nowt we can do about it, but, so let’s get on with the job.’
He climbed out of the car. Wield, undeceived by this display of stoic indifference, fixed his gaze on the vehicle’s dashboard which was cracked in half.
‘Having trouble, sir?’
‘Aye,’ said Dalziel, rubbing his left hand. ‘Speedo got stuck, so I gave it a whack.’
‘Hope I never get stuck,’ murmured Wield, closing the door gently.
‘Hope you’re going to get started,’ said Dalziel. ‘Turnbull. From the top.’
Wield was the Schubert of report makers, compressing into little space what others would have struggled to express in symphonies. Even the fact that the greater part of his mind was struggling to accommodate the news about Rosie Pascoe didn’t inhibit the flow and in the short walk from the car park to the station office, where sight of Dalziel sent Sergeant Clark snapping to attention, he brought the Fat Man up to strength.
Mention of Turnbull’s solicitor made Dalziel smile. He liked it when suspects ran crying to their briefs.
‘Dick Hoddle? Nose goes one way, teeth go t’other?’
‘That’s the one.’
‘Bit rich for the likes of Geordie Turnbull, I’d’ve thought.’
‘He’s done well, sir. His old boss left him the business or something.’
‘Need to be something like that,’ said Dalziel. ‘Didn’t strike me as the kind to save up his bawbees. So what do you reckon, Wieldy?’
‘Turnbull’s co-operating like a lamb,’ said the sergeant. ‘OK, he called up Hoddle, but in the circs, who wouldn’t? Waived his right to be present during the search of his premises. Hoddle wasn’t happy, but Geordie said something like, if it was a drugs bust, it ‘ud be different, everyone knew the cops were capable of planting shit all over the place, but not even Mid-Yorks CID was going to fit someone up in a case like this.’
Dalziel, unoffended, said, ‘He’s not so daft. This trainer and the ribbon from the car … ?’
‘Novello’s taken them round to show the parents. They’re not an exact match with the description of what the litt
le girl was likely wearing, but not a million miles off.’
‘And Turnbull says … ?’
‘Seems he often has kids in his car. Does a lot locally, ferrying folk about, kids to football matches, that sort of thing. But not just kids. Old folk, disabled, all sorts. He’s well liked.’
‘So was the Duke of Windsor,’ said Dalziel. ‘You’ve still not told me what you reckon.’
‘Same as in Dendale. I reckon everyone who knows him, even the odd husband who doesn’t like him, would be amazed if he turned out to be our man,’ said Wield. ‘And I reckon I would too. Which means he’s either very, very clever, or we should be looking somewhere else.’
‘Oh aye? Any suggestions where?’
Wield took a deep breath and said, ‘Mebbe you’d best talk to Sergeant Clark, sir.’
‘I will, when he’s recovered from his fit. Can you hear me, Sergeant, or is it rigor mortis?’
Clark, who on the better-safe-than-sorry principle had opted to remain in a sort of half attention posture, let his muscles relax.
‘Right, lad. I gather you’ve got some ghost stories to tell me. Off you go.’
Clark had few of Wield’s narrative skills and Dalziel let his impatience show.
‘So Mrs Hardcastle that everyone reckons has gone a bit doolally with grief has started seeing things? Sounds like it’s her doctor she should be talking to, not hard-worked coppers. You don’t agree, lad?’
Clark, who lacked the guile to conceal his resentment of Dalziel’s dismissive remarks about Molly Hardcastle, said, ‘I think she saw summat, sir.’
‘Summat?’ Dalziel spat out the word like a cocktail cherry found lurking in a single malt. ‘You mean, summat like a sheep? Or a bush? Or summat?’
The sergeant was saved from a possible test to destruction by the entrance of Shirley Novello.
‘Ivor, make me day. Tell us the Dacres have given us a positive on the stuff you found in Turnbull’s car.’
‘The trainer, a definite no,’ she said. ‘But the ribbon, a maybe. Lorraine liked ribbons, collected them, did swops with friends, so she ended up with a whole boxful. No way of saying what was in there and which she took out that morning. The hair on the one from Turnbull’s car’s our best bet. They’ll be checking that against samples taken from the girl’s bedroom. But that’s going to take a little while.’
‘Bloody marvellous,’ groaned Dalziel. ‘Which leaves me with a ferret down my trousers.’
Meaning, Shirley guessed, that if he kept Turnbull too long, he’d start biting, and if he let him go too soon, he’d be out of sight down the nearest hole.
The Fat Man was regarding her broodingly.
‘It was you got on to Turnbull in the first place, right?’
‘With Sergeant Wield’s help,’ she said cautiously.
‘No. Credit where it’s due. You did well. Again.’
He didn’t make it sound like something he expected her to make a habit of.
‘So, what do you reckon to this Turnbull? He were reckoned a bit of a masher back in Dendale. So what’s the female view. Still got it, has he?’
‘He’s … attractive,’ she said. ‘Not physically, I mean, not his appearance, but he’s got… charm.’
‘Charm?’ Dalziel savoured the word. ‘Would kids like him?’
‘Oh, yes. I think so.’
‘And could he like kids?’
‘Sexually? I don’t know. I’d have said he was pretty well focused on mature women, preferably those who were safely married and were happy to have a fling without wanting to rock the boat…’
‘But?’ said Dalziel, who could spot buts the butters didn’t know they were butting.
Novello hesitated then flung caution to the winds.
‘But it could be a double bluff. Or not bluff, meaning not conscious. He could chase women because he doesn’t want to admit to himself that he really wants to chase little girls…’
The look on Dalziel’s face made her wish she could whistle the winds back.
He said, ‘Well thank you, Mrs Freud. You been at the communion wine, or you got half the ghost of a reason for spouting this crap?’
She said defiantly, ‘He’s worried about something, I can tell.’
To her ears, it sounded far weaker and wafflier than what she’d said before, but to her surprise, Dalziel nodded almost approvingly and said, ‘Well, that’s something. Wieldy?’
‘Aye. I’d say so, too,’ said the sergeant.
Novello felt like kissing him. Perhaps he’d turn into a frog?
‘Right then, let’s go and have a chat afore Hoddle starts ringing the Home Office.’
‘Shall I come?’ said Novello hopefully.
Dalziel thought, then shook his head.
‘No,’ he said. ‘No distractions.’ Then, observing the look of disappointment which this time she could not disguise, he condescended to explain. ‘This Turnbull, I recall him and I know his sort. Women make ‘em sparkle. Can’t help it. Hang him upside down over a tub of maggots and bring a woman into the room and he’d feel better. I don’t want him feeling better. I want him feeling bloody terrified! Come on, Wieldy. And don’t forget the maggots!’
And Novello, watching them go, felt almost sorry for Geordie Turnbull.
Three hours later, Dalziel was feeling sorry for no one but himself. Also he had a lousy headache.
It was called Dick Hoddle and it wouldn’t go away, not unless it took Geordie Turnbull with it.
It didn’t help that the interview room made the Book and Candle snug (which he remembered with great longing) look like the Albert Hall. Its one window wouldn’t open (the result of paint and rust rather than security) and even with the door left ajar, the temperature in there would have cooked meringues.
Hoddle was clearly a meticulous man. Every hour on the hour he made a case for the interview to end, in progressively stronger terms. This was his third.
‘My client has been co-operative beyond the call of civility in each and all of its principal senses…’
He paused, as if inviting Dalziel to demand definition, but the Fat Man didn’t oblige. There had been a time before tape recorders became a fixed feature of interview rooms when he might have offered to push each and all of the lawyer’s crooked teeth down his crooked throat if he didn’t belt up and let his client speak for himself. Not that that would have been altogether fair, as Turnbull on several occasions had volunteered answers against his brief’s advice. But Dalziel wasn’t feeling altogether fair, just altogether pissed off.
‘.. and as it became clear to me, as a reasonable man, a good two hours ago that he had no case to answer, I can only assume that even your good self must by now have reached the same conclusion. You are, of course, entitled to hang on to him for twenty-four hours from the time of his arrest…’
‘And another twelve on top of that, if I give the word,’ interjected Dalziel.
‘Indeed. But admit it, Superintendent, there is no prospect that you are going to be able to charge my client with anything, so any attempt to prolong the agony might appear merely malicious and would certainly add weight to any case Mr Turnbull might already be contemplating for police harassment and false arrest.’
‘No,’ said Geordie Turnbull firmly. ‘There’ll be nothing of that. Once I’m free of here, I’ll be happy not to have any contact with the law in any form for the next fifteen years.’
Dalziel noted the time span, tried to hear it as an admission that his urge to kill had gone off and wouldn’t be returning for another decade and a half, failed, and scratched his lower chin so vigorously the sound-level needle on the recorder jumped.
The door opened behind him. He looked round. It was Wield, who’d been summoned out a few minutes earlier by Novello. Not an easy face to read, but to Dalziel’s expert eye he didn’t look like he’d just ridden from Aix to Ghent.
At least it gave him a temporary out. He suspended the interview, flicked off the machine and went out into the corridor.
/>
‘Cheer me up,’ he invited.
‘They do a nice pint round the comer at the Queen’s Head,’ said Wield with a sympathetic glance at the Fat Man’s sweat-beaded brow.
‘And that’s it?’
‘If it’s cheer you want, sir. Word from Forensic. That hair on the ribbon, definitely not Lorraine’s. And so far nothing else in the car which suggests she’s ever been in it. Same with the stuff Novello got from that rubbish bin.’
‘Shit,’ said Dalziel.
‘You really fancy him for it, do you, sir?’
‘When you’re in the clag, you fancy whatever you’ve got, as the gravedigger said to the corpse. God, I hate that bastard. I’d really like to bang him up and throw away the key.’
‘Turnbull?’ said Wield, surprised.
‘No! Hoddle, his sodding brief. Any more good news?’
‘Not from Bixford. If Turnbull stood for MP, he’d get elected. The ladies think he’s lovely, the men think he’s a grand chap so long as it’s not their particular lady he’s chatting up. The vicar’s ready to pawn the church silver if dear Geordie needs bail. And his congregation would rather trust their kids with Geordie Turnbull than with Dr Barnado.’
‘Oh aye? It’ll be a different tale once word starts getting around and the tongues start wagging. These Christians can forgive owt save innocence. You think he’s innocent, Wieldy?’
Wield shrugged and said, ‘Makes no difference, does it? Without we’ve got a lot more, or even a little more, I think we’re flummoxed. How about you, sir?’
‘I don’t know,’ said the Fat Man. ‘There’s summat there that doesn’t smell right … he’s not mad enough, maybe that’s it. Hoddle’s threatening all kinds of false arrest shit, but Tumbull’s being all laid-back and forgiving. And he’s from Newcastle! When them buggers finish telling you how many times they won the Cup, they start listing all the bad offside decisions against them since 1893.’
‘Doubt that’ll stand up in court, sir,’ said Wield.
On Beulah Height Page 21