Singing the Sadness

by Reginald Hill

  Subtle change of subject.

  ‘They would have been,’ said Lewis, ‘but that chap Ursell seems unhappy to accept it was probably just an accident caused by those cowboy scaffolders. Strange fellow that. Came here from the Midlands a couple of years back and has never seemed fully to adapt to our comparatively crime-free atmosphere. Rather look under a rock than sit on it, if you know what I mean. What do you make of him, as a fellow professional?’

  ‘Hardly know him really,’ said Joe.

  ‘Oh? I thought I saw you deep in conversation with him after the accident.’

  ‘Just passing the time of day,’ said Joe. ‘I asked him about the woman in Copa.’

  ‘Ah yes. And how’s she doing?’

  ‘No change. They seem hopeful, though.’

  ‘As are we all. Something special you wanted to talk to Owain about, was there?’

  It took Joe a second to recall his excuse for being in the Lady House.

  He thought he caught a glimpse of that superior caught-you-out expression on Lewis’s face and decided he’d been on the back foot long enough.

  ‘Can’t tell you that,’ he said. ‘Client confidentiality.’

  ‘Client?’ Lewis pursed his lips in a silent whistle. ‘Do you mean you are a client of Owain’s? Hardly. So I presume that someone else has hired you and you believe my son can help you with your enquiries, whatever they may be. Am I right?’

  ‘Sorry. Not at liberty,’ said Joe, wishing he had stayed on the back foot.

  ‘Don’t worry. I quite understand about professional ethics. Such thorny problems constantly strew the path of us professional men, eh?’

  Some boring fart in Luton Reference Library had once tried to explain postmodern irony to Joe, but he’d nodded off before he could get to grips with it. Good old-fashioned sarcasm he could smell a mile off, though.

  ‘Yeah, man, must have been like that for you with Glyn Matthias,’ he said. He regretted it instantly. Man playing dumb should never let himself be provoked into being a smartass.

  He saw Lewis’s gaze flicker momentarily to the shotgun as though he too were having regrets.

  ‘Fascinating,’ he said. ‘Barely two days here and already you are in professional employment and the local gossips have taken you into their confidence. Either you are a prince in your profession or, as I have often suspected, rural Wales’s reputation for being a close and secretive society is merely an invention of the kind of literary exile who writes plays for Radio 4.’

  ‘Just I met this guy at the Goat and Axle,’ Joe heard himself explaining while that inner voice which at home ventriloquized Whitey was saying, ‘Hold your peace, dickhead.’

  ‘Good Lord,’ said Lewis, mock-amazement sitting not very comfortably on something else that might have been genuine shock. ‘Depths within depths. In a trice you have gone where few strangers penetrate and whence fewer return, the inner sanctum of disinformation and disaffection. Naturally I cannot discuss with you the details of Mr Matthias’s professional relationship with Branddreth, except to say how sorry I was to lose the services of such a distinguished musician. However, my overriding concern as High Master must always be for the welfare of my pupils.’

  ‘I can see that,’ said Joe, thinking that as he’d come this far, he might as well push a bit further. ‘Should have thought, you being so friendly with Mr Penty-Hooser, you could see anyone threatening your pupils got put away like he deserves. Always supposing you had the evidence, that is.’

  ‘I see. That’s the way the Goat and Axle spin doctors are presenting things, is it? Yes, I’m happy to claim John Penty-Hooser as an old and close friend, but you should understand this, Mr Sixsmith – any influence I might have with the authorities was used to dissuade them from bringing charges against Matthias. Once he was removed from the orbit of Branddreth, I could not find any satisfaction at the prospect of seeing a man of his talents publicly disgraced and possibly jailed for what is simply a genetic weakness.’

  He finished with the modest self-deprecating gesture of a man who expects, though he doesn’t desire, applause.

  Joe said, ‘But the guy’s still teaching at the comp., right?’

  ‘Oh, the public sector,’ said Lewis dismissively. ‘Try giving them advice. Even in our rural fastness, the liberal trendies have long since penetrated there. Wasted breath, Mr Sixsmith. Wasted breath. Which like your time I must not waste any more of. Let me apologize again for so distressing you. It may be some small retrospective consolation to know the shotgun was not loaded.’

  ‘Now that’s a real comfort,’ said Joe.

  He didn’t mean it.

  Partly because it made no difference to a man who’d been scared just this side of fouling his pants to hear there’d been no real danger after all.

  But mainly because when Lewis had gone back down to the cellar to collect the head, Joe had checked the gun.

  It was loaded all right, both barrels.

  Suddenly, as he drove away from the Lady House, it felt very good to be alive.

  Chapter 16

  Joe’s euphoria only lasted as far as up the hill to Copa Cottage.

  He’d instinctively turned away from Llanffugiol. Ursell was probably still there and he didn’t have any answers yet for the DI.

  There was no sign of anyone around the burnt-out shell, so he pulled in and got out of the car. Despite the warm sun, he shivered as he walked around the ruin. If the coach hadn’t broken down … if Big Merv hadn’t got lost … if …

  There were a thousand ifs, each of them ending with the mystery woman and an even more mysterious pile of ashes. And there seemed almost as many unanswered questions, most of which looked like they’d have to wait on her recovering consciousness … if she ever did.

  He pushed that last unthinkable if to the back of his mind and examined some of the questions.

  What the shoot was DI Ursell playing at? Were the Goat and Axle boys into burning English-owned cottages to make a political point? Or were they simply so anti-Lewis because of this festival thing that they’d burn down Copa just to disoblige him anyway? And all these people eager to hire him to find out about the woman, what did they really want to know about her? And where did poor student Wain Lewis get all that folding money he’d handed over as deposit?

  Joe pulled out the boy’s money and looked at it as if in hope of an answer. The notes were all well used. He checked to see if they were numbered in order, like they’d come from a bank, and wasn’t surprised to find they weren’t. As he started to push them back into his pocket, one fell loose, and a light breeze gusted up to carry it away from him over the burnt-out cottage, fading away to drop it right in the middle of the ashes.

  ‘Shoot,’ said Joe.

  For some reason he felt reluctant to tread over the ashes, but it was crazy to leave a fiver lying out there, especially when he had every intention of returning the money to the boy soon as he saw him. In any case, what was bugging him? It wasn’t as if anyone had actually died here. Nothing in these ashes that had once been living.

  Delicately, in order to cause as little disturbance as possible, he moved towards the note.

  As he stooped to pick it up, he saw a faint shape outlined in the ash beneath. He used the banknote to brush the grey deposit away. Something metallic. Gingerly he picked it up and shook it clean. A bracelet. Or what had once been a bracelet, with a small chain, its links now fused by the fire’s searing heat, and a buckled lozenge of metal which might have once had something etched into it but which was now utterly illegible. He was going to throw it down when suddenly he realized he knew what it was, or might have been. He’d seen a barmaid at his Luton local wearing something like this. When he’d made a comment, she’d explained it was an allergy-alert bracelet, so that if she was ever in an accident and unable to speak, the medics would know that penicillin did nasty things to her. ‘Makes me all swell up,’ she confided to Joe, who’d looked at her well-developed figure and agreed that this would be gilding
the lily.

  Chances of it belonging to the burnt woman were slight, and chances of it being any help to the cops were slighter still. But Joe had come to understand he was as likely to stumble on significant things by accident as he was to work them out by intellect. He pocketed it with the banknote and made his way back to the Morris and considered his next move.

  He felt curiously out of sorts with himself, restless, rather depressed. Back home he rarely felt like this, or at least not for long. Maybe that was because back home there was always something to be getting on with, even if it was only strolling down to the pub for a pint. Man who felt at a loose end in Luton was probably at a loose end in life. But here in the sticks there was nothing to be at but loose ends. Pointless going for a stroll even, ‘less you had a girl and a blanket. Nothing to look at but trees and sheep. Joe could tell a sheep from a tree but further distinction seemed neither profitable nor pleasurable. Paul Robeson must have visited a different part of the Principality, he told himself, feeling a sharp pang of longing for the sound of traffic, the drift of a crowded pavement, the sweet smell of fat and vinegar from a passing chippie; buildings, machines, humanity.

  Nearest he’d get to that round here was Caerlindys. Excuse for going there? To check up on the woman in the hospital. Also to give thanks for the care he’d received during his short stay.

  In fact, not excuses, but good reasons.

  Cheered, he got into the Morris which cheered him some more. This was one area in which the country had it over the city. Not much fun edging your way through Luton’s notorious one-way maze in the rush hour.

  Taking his bearings vaguely from the sun, he kept going till he hit a road wide enough to have a white line painted on it and main enough to have a real signpost instead of a bit of wood nailed to a tree.

  According to this, Caerlindys was only ten miles away. He made it nearer fifteen on the clock, but maybe a Welsh mile was different. Or maybe he’d better get the clock checked.

  He’d not paid much attention to the place last time he was here, but now he saw it was a country town small enough for him to take in at a glance as he motored down the slope of the valley in which it was set. He didn’t complain. After twenty-four hours around Llanffugiol, it looked like a metropolis.

  He drove right into the middle till the street spread itself out into a sort of square and parked in a line of classy-looking cars along the kerb. Then he got out and looked around, just for the pleasure of seeing traffic and people and shops.

  ‘Can’t leave your car there,’ said a voice in his ear.

  He looked round to see he was being addressed by a traffic warden. This was feeling more like being at home every minute, he thought. Luton’s traffic wardens were known as the wolf pack from their ability to sniff out an illegally parked vehicle while the engine was still hot.

  This one was a woman, square enough to be Nye Garage’s sister, with eyes like hammer drills.

  Joe smiled at her sweetly.

  ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Didn’t realize this was no parking.’

  He glanced with only mild irony at the other cars, but the warden took it as an aggressive argument.

  ‘Well, you know now, don’t you, sir,’ she said, pronouncing sir with a sibilance which made it sound like a term of abuse.

  ‘Hello there, Rita. Having trouble?’ said a male voice.

  ‘Not yet,’ said the woman.

  Joe glanced round to see a uniformed sergeant approaching. Now he felt really at home. Then his gaze took in the face as well as the uniform.

  Recognition was mutual. Richard Burton.

  ‘Sergeant Prince, isn’t it?’ he said.

  He got an impression of debate and decision, almost simultaneous, then the man’s face split in a smile and he said, ‘It’s Mr Sixsmith, isn’t it? How are you, sir? I never had the chance to shake you by the hand.’

  Which he now proceeded to do with such vigour that passers-by paused, probably in the hope of witnessing a novel form of prearrest restraint. But once the cop made clear what he was doing and why, smiles became universal and a small queue formed to follow his example.

  Joe was touched but more than a little embarrassed. Being a hero was nice, but like birthdays, once a year was enough, and yesterday had overdosed him.

  Prince seemed to sense this and intervened, putting his arm round Joe’s shoulders protectively and saying, ‘That’ll do now, wear him out, you will, and him not long out of his sickbed. You just taking the chance to have a look round our little town, Mr Sixsmith?’

  ‘Looking to find the hospital, actually,’ said Joe, as the little crowd moved away.

  ‘For treatment, is it?’ asked the sergeant solicitously.

  ‘Oh no. I’m fine, well, I’m OK. But thought I’d like to find out how the young woman is, the one from the cottage.’

  ‘Oh. I see. Very commendable, if I may say so. Tell you what, I’ve got to go up there to check her out myself. Why don’t we walk together? It’s just a step and it’ll save you getting mobbed by your fans, eh?’

  This seemed a long shot to Joe, but he knew better than to turn down an offer of help from the police.

  He said, ‘What about the car? Shouldn’t I move it?’

  ‘Don’t be daft. Right as rain there, it is, long as you like. I’ll leave a little note just in case Rita here goes off duty and one of her chums wanders along.’

  Rita didn’t look happy but she watched in silence as the sergeant scribbled something on a yellow sticky notepad, tore off the sheet, then studied the window carefully in search of the best place to stick it. It was at this point that Joe noticed the tax disc was three years out of date.

  ‘There,’ said the cop, placing the yellow square precisely over the disc. ‘That’ll keep everybody happy.’

  ‘Thanks, Sarge,’ said Joe. ‘You’ve got the right name.’

  ‘Wish you’d tell my missus that,’ laughed the sergeant.

  As they moved away, Joe nodded towards the other cars.

  ‘Don’t see many more notes to teacher,’ he commented.

  ‘What? Ah, I’m with you. No need. Councillors’ cars, see? By their numbers shall ye know them. Should be six six six in most cases.’

  ‘Here is mystery,’ said Joe, whose upbringing under Mirabelle’s tutelage had left him no slouch at a biblical quotation. ‘Don’t look much like council offices to me.’

  He glanced up at the long grey building before which the cars were parked. A sign over its imposing entrance read THE OLD DRAGON above a depiction of the fiery beast in bright red, with beneath it in smaller letters Philip Feathers Prop. and Licensee.

  ‘That’s the thing, see, council chambers are closed for refurbishment so they’re holding their meetings here pro tem, only there’s no official parking here, public highway, isn’t it? But we can’t have our democratic representatives dissipating their energies having to walk maybe a hundred yards or more, can we? So Mr Feathers, who’s on the council’s police committee, asked our brass if they could help out, all unofficial like, of course, couldn’t be official now, could it? That would be undemocratic, and they’re all good democrats round here. That’s the way we do things here in Wales, Mr Sixsmith.’

  He spoke with an amused irony which implied he didn’t see any harm in this.

  Joe said, ‘Not just Wales. We got councillors like that back home.’

  In fact, generally speaking, Joe found the Luton politicos he knew personally were a nice enough bunch, always willing to give him the time of day and listen to his gripes and suggestions. He wasn’t so naive not to recognize that most of them reckoned he had some kind of constituency it was worth their while to cultivate, but he reckoned he was well able to sort out the true tossers from the amiable flannellers. But playing the yeah-I’ve-been-there-too card with Prince seemed a good move. When you get a cop on your side, keep him there even if it takes verbal superglue.

  ‘Bet you have. Same the whole world over. Doubt if you’ve got anyone like Rita Me
ter back there, though. Lucky I came along. I think she was about to put a wheel clamp on you.’

  ‘Oh, our cars get clamped regular back home,’ said Joe.

  ‘No, I meant on you personally,’ laughed Prince. ‘Home’s Luton, that right, Joe? OK to call you Joe? I’m Tom, by the way.’

  Knows I’m from Luton. Knows I’m called Joe. Well, why not, probably in the local paper anyway, so everyone knows.

  ‘Yeah, Luton,’ he said. ‘You know it, Tom?’

  ‘Been there,’ said Prince. ‘Once.’

  ‘Spent most of your career round here then?’

  Joe was just making conversation but this got him a quick appraising glance before the man answered, ‘No. Been here and there. Only been in these parts a few months.’

  ‘Yeah? How do you like it?’

  ‘Seems fine so far,’ said Prince. ‘Mind you, I’m still working out the lie of the land. Do as you’re told, make no waves, not till you know who you’ll be sinking, that’s the way I was brought up. So when I’m told to keep parking spaces free for the council, that’s what I do.’

  ‘Seems a wise move to me,’ said Joe. ‘No point getting the wrong side of GM till you got to, is there?’

  Prince didn’t pause in his stride but Joe felt him go still.

  ‘GM?’ he said. ‘Now what would that mean?’

  ‘Just something I heard, way the locals talk about the boys with clout round here; maybe I picked it up wrong,’ back-pedalled Joe.

  ‘Maybe you did, Joe. So how are you finding things out at Branddreth College? Making you comfortable, are they?’

  ‘It’s fine,’ said Joe.

  ‘See anything of the fellow who runs it, Lewis, is that his name?’

  Why would you be unsure? wondered Joe. In his experience, when cops started asking casual questions, they were pumping you. Easiest way to deal with that was hide nothing you weren’t desperate to hide, then you couldn’t be tripped up.

  ‘Had dinner with him last night,’ he said. ‘Haggards, people who own Copa Cottage, were there too. Wanted to talk to me about what happened.’