A Dedicated Man ib-2

by Peter Robinson

  Banks and David seemed to have settled into buying rounds, the two men drinking pints of bitter and the women lager and lime. Banks had to watch his intake because he didn’t want to appear even slightly intoxicated in the village where he was conducting a murder investigation. Two pints in an hour and a half wasn’t at all bad, he told himself, but it was only just after eight o’clock. He was aware that he tended to speed up towards closing time.

  The first intermission came and people started making their ways to the toilets and the bar. As he walked down the narrow aisle, Jack Barker noticed Banks’s party and came over.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said, extending his hand. ‘What a surprise to find you here. I’d no idea you were a folkie.’ There was just enough of a twinkle in his eye to make the irony apparent. ‘Mind if I join you for a moment?’ He grabbed a nearby chair and pulled it up before Banks could object. ‘Is it just Miss Cartwright you’ve come to hear?’

  ‘Actually, it’s Ms Cartwright,’ Banks corrected him. ‘And yes, I’ve heard she’s very good.’ His tone was brusque; he wished Barker would go away.

  ‘You’re in for a real treat, Chief Inspector, a real treat. People come from miles away to hear Penny Cartwright, you know. She’s got a solid reputation in these parts, especially since she gave up fame and fortune to return to her roots. People appreciate that.’

  From what Banks had heard, appreciation wasn’t quite the word for the gossip that had surrounded Penny’s return to her roots, but he kept quiet. Barker obviously wanted to show off, and, short of being rude, there was no way to stop him. Sandra returned from the Ladies and looked at Barker curiously. There was no escape, Banks realized, cursing himself; he would have to introduce them.

  Barker favoured the women with what Banks suspected was a well-practised Clark Gable smile.

  ‘Delighted,’ he said theatrically, taking Sandra’s hand. ‘I never imagined a policeman’s wife could be so charming and so beautiful.’ Banks was irritated; David simply looked on, a vacant grin on his face.

  It was not only Barker’s charm and social finesse that annoyed Banks. It was all very well socializing in the community, but to be seen with his wife openly fraternizing with a suspect jarred against his deepest instincts as a detective. It made him feel conspicuous, for one thing, and that was a feeling he disliked. Gristhorpe’s advice – get in there and let them talk to you – was all very well, but a line had to be drawn. He was off duty, and the whole thing was just too pally for his taste. He was sucking on his dead pipe, glowering and contributing monosyllables only when necessary.

  ‘How do you manage to fit in here?’ Sandra asked after Barker had told her his occupation. ‘Aren’t writers usually regarded with a good deal of suspicion?’

  Barker nodded. ‘True. They didn’t like me being here at first,’ he replied. ‘Not one bit. You’re right – people don’t trust writers in small communities, and they’ve good reason not to. Some communities have had bad experiences with chaps who live among them, fit in, then go and write devastating critiques, hardly even bothering to disguise names and identities. It’s like the way some Indians see photographers – people who steal their souls. Quite right too, in my opinion. The kind of writers they have in mind are unscrupulous. They give us all a bad name.’

  ‘But don’t you think writers have to be a little ruthless?’ Harriet asked. ‘Especially if they’re to tell the truth.’

  ‘Perhaps. But the ones I’m talking about accept your hospitality, then strip you naked on the page. Some writers even worm their way into people’s confidence and set up situations, manipulate events just to see how their “characters” will react. I knew one chap, for example, who used to throw regular parties. This was in London. Real lavish dos they were, no expense spared – champers, single malt Scotch, beluga caviar, quail – more than anyone could hope to devour in an evening. When everyone got sozzled and started arguing, crying or pawing other people’s partners, there he was, sober as a judge, sitting in a corner making mental notes. It took people a long time to figure out what was going on – after all, they were having a good time – but sure enough, they’d appear, thinly disguised, in stories published in magazines, and their friends and colleagues would recognize them. A couple of marriages broke up, reputations were destroyed. All in the name of “art”. After a while, attendance dropped dramatically.’

  ‘What happened to him?’ Harriet asked, sitting on the edge of her chair.

  Barker shrugged. ‘Moved on, I suppose. I’ve no idea where he is now. Pastures new. He still publishes regularly.’

  ‘And is that what you do, Mr Barker?’ Sandra asked. ‘Move in on people and steal their souls.’

  Barker laughed. ‘Please, call me Jack,’ he said, and Banks felt his upper lip begin to curl. ‘No, that’s not what I do at all. At first everyone was suspicious of me, but then they always are like that with incomers, as they call us. After a while, out of curiosity I suppose, someone read a couple of my books, then someone else, and their comments got around. As soon as everyone realized I wrote hard-boiled private-eye stories set in southern California in the thirties, they decided I wasn’t a threat. Believe it or not, I even have a few fans here.’

  ‘I know,’ Harriet said. ‘I’ve carried enough of your books around in the mobile library.’

  Barker honoured her with a smile. ‘As soon as they get to know you’re harmless,’ he went on, ‘you’re as close to being accepted as you’ll ever be. It was the same with Harry.’

  ‘What about Harry?’ Banks asked, trying to sound casual but failing miserably. Sandra frowned at him for being a killjoy.

  ‘All I meant,’ Barker explained, ‘was that Harry was a writer too, in his way, but nobody ever worried about him because he wrote about the Romans and old lead mines. I mean, only people like Penny and Michael Ramsden were interested. That stuff’s as dry as dust to most people.’ He looked back at the ladies and smiled again, clearly hoping to get off on another track.

  ‘Do you know Ramsden well?’ Banks asked, unmoved by Barker’s discomfort and Sandra’s piercing glances. Harriet and Sandra began to chat between themselves, and David looked on, lost.

  ‘I’ve met him,’ Barker replied curtly.

  ‘What do you think of him?’

  ‘Pleasant enough fellow,’ he said, looking to the women for support in his levity. ‘But you can hardly expect a writer to say nice things about an editor, can you? I spend two days working on a fine descriptive paragraph, and my editor wants it cut out because it slows the action.’

  ‘Ramsden’s not your publisher, though, is he?’ Banks persisted.

  ‘Good Lord, no. He only deals with academic stuff.’

  ‘Did you know about Ramsden and Penny Cartwright?’

  ‘That was years ago. What on earth are you getting at?’

  ‘Just trying to sort out the tangle of relationships,’ Banks answered, smiling. ‘That’s all.’

  ‘Look, they’re starting again,’ Barker said, rising. ‘Please excuse me.’ He gave a brief bow to Harriet and Sandra, then made his way back to the front. It was almost eight thirty. As the lights dimmed, Banks saw him talking to Penny and glancing back over his shoulder. The last thing he noticed before it got too dim was Barker whispering in Penny’s ear and Penny looking behind her and laughing.

  As the master of ceremonies began his rambling and incoherent introduction, Sandra leaned over to Banks. ‘You were a bit sharp with him, weren’t you?’ she said. ‘Was it really necessary? You did promise we were having a social evening.’

  Banks muttered a sullen apology and busied himself with his pipe. It wasn’t a new situation, the job interfering with his personal life, but it never ceased to cause friction. Perhaps Sandra had expected the move to change all that. A new life. What rubbish, Banks thought. Different landscapes, same old people with the same old failings. He gestured to the waiter to bring another round. Bugger it, let someone else drive home. It was a social occasion, after all, he remin
ded himself ironically.

  Penny Cartwright took the stage to much applause and several loud whistles from the back of the room. Banks was still furious with Barker for being so damn charming and witty, and with Sandra for encouraging him and with himself for spoiling it. He attacked the fresh pint of bitter with angry gusto and glared at his pipe as if it were at the root of all his troubles. It had gone out yet again and he was sick to death of tamping, emptying, cleaning, scraping and relighting it.

  Penny began with an unaccompanied ballad called ‘Still Growing’. It was a sad tale about an arranged marriage between a woman and a boy on the edge of manhood. The husband died young and the widow lamented, ‘O once I had a sweetheart, but now I have none. / Death has put an end to his growing.’ The story was simply and economically told, and Banks found himself entering into the music as he did with opera, his recent irritation wrapped up and put away in a dim corner of his mind. Her voice had both passion and control – it was that of a survivor singing about the lost and the less fortunate with honest sympathy. She was an alto, pitched lower than Banks had expected, husky on the low notes but pure and clear in the higher range.

  Banks clapped loudly when she finished, and Sandra turned to him with raised eyebrows and a smile of appreciation. Other songs in the same traditional folk vein followed, and sometimes Penny accompanied herself on guitar while another young woman playing the flute or the fiddle joined her. Mixed in with the stories of demon lovers and forbidden affairs were light-hearted jigs and reels and sensational broadside ballads, like ‘The Murder of Maria Marten’.

  Despite his enjoyment of the music, Banks found his mind wandering back to Barker’s reaction to the mention of Michael Ramsden. There had seemed to be a dislike beyond the general lack of love between writers and publishers. Ramsden had been a close friend of Steadman’s and had known Penny Cartwright since childhood. Did they still see each other, despite what they said? Was Barker simply jealous? And if he was jealous of Ramsden, wasn’t he also likely to have felt the same way about Steadman?

  Banks looked at Penny and noticed Barker’s finely chiselled handsome profile in silhouette. He was in love with her, of course. Ramsden had been right to suggest that possibility. And who could blame him? Her beauty was radiant; her talent was moving. But she and Ramsden had parted. Of course, it had happened years ago, before she had fully blossomed, and it could only have been puppy love. Still, such events endure in small communities. Perhaps to some of the more shrewish local gossips Penny would always be known as a wayward lass who lost that nice Michael Ramsden who had gone on and done so well for himself. And what did Ramsden really feel about their parting?

  Banks laid his pipe to rest in the ashtray and Penny announced ‘Like Musgrave and Lady Barnard’, the last song of the set.

  TWO

  At about nine o’clock, Sally Lumb left the house on Hill Road. Because it was Friday, her mother was at bingo in Eastvale with Mrs Crawford, and her father was down in the public bar of the Bridge playing in a local darts match. They wouldn’t be back till about eleven o’clock, which gave her plenty of time. There would be no awkward questions to answer.

  Despite the gathering clouds, it was a warm evening: a bit too hot and sticky, if anything. Sally knew from experience that such signs meant a storm was on its way. She walked down the hill and turned left, by the Bridge, on to High Street. It was a quiet time in Helmthorpe; most people were either in the pubs or sat glued to the idiot box in their living rooms. There’d be nothing much stirring until closing time unless a party of campers got too rowdy at the Hare and Hounds disco and Big Cyril had to chuck them out.

  She walked on down the street and paused outside the Dog and Gun. The front door was open and she could hear singing from inside. Penny Cartwright, by the sound of it. Sally had heard her before but hadn’t known she was singing in the village that evening. She looked at her watch. Plenty of time. The words of the song drifted out on the humid air:

  ‘A grave, a grave,’ Lord Barnard cried, ‘To put these lovers in; But bury my lady on the top For she was of noble kin.’

  With the familiar tune in her mind, Sally walked on, pausing for a moment to listen to the broad beck flowing under the bridge at the eastern end of High Street. She quickened her pace and, leaving the road, struck out up the long wild southern slope of the dale, past where she and Kevin had seen Penny the other day. She had an appointment to keep, a warning to give. Everything would be sorted out soon.

  THREE

  During the intermission, Penny Cartwright walked by Banks on her way out of the pub and flashed him a cool smile of acknowledgment. Barker, following closely behind her, nodded and bowed to Harriet and Sandra.

  ‘She’s so talented and beautiful,’ Sandra said after they’d gone. ‘Surely she can’t be one of your suspects?’

  Banks just told her that Penny had been a friend of the victim, and Sandra left it at that. The four chatted about the music, which they had all enjoyed, ordered more drinks, suffered through a mercifully short set of contemporary ‘protest’ folk music, and awaited Penny’s second set. She came back at ten fifteen and walked straight to the stage.

  This time there was a new, slightly distant quality in her performance. She was still involved in what she did, but it didn’t have the same emotional cutting edge. Banks listened to the ballads and was struck by the parallel that he was dealing with exactly the same kinds of feelings and events that the old songs were forged from. And he wondered how the ballad of Harry Steadman would end. Nobody would be ‘hung high’, of course, not these days. But who would the killer turn out to be? What was his motive, and what would be Banks’s own part in the song? All of a sudden, it seemed as if he was in another century, and that this beautiful young woman in the spotlight, life’s disappointments and cruelties showing just enough in her voice to intensify her beauty, was singing a tragic ballad about the murder of Harry Steadman.

  The sharp change to a brisk singalong tune snapped him out of his reverie, and he finished off his drink, noting that he immediately felt impatient for another. He was drunk, or at least tipsy, and it wasn’t far off closing time. If Barker was in love with the girl, and if there had been anything between her and Steadman… If Ramsden still… If Mrs Steadman knew… If Steadman and his wife hadn’t been quite as close as everyone made out… The random thoughts curled like pipe smoke and evaporated in the air.

  When the set ended to loud and prolonged applause, Banks caught the passing waiter and ordered another pint for himself and a half for David. Sandra looked at him with a hint of reprimand in her eyes, but he just shrugged and grinned foolishly. He had never had a problem with alcohol, but he knew he could sometimes be quite adolescent in his consumption of numerous pints. He could tell that Sandra was worried he might make an idiot of himself, but he knew he could handle his drink. He hadn’t had all that much, anyway. There might even be room for another one if he had time.

  FOUR

  There was going to be a storm, Sally was sure of it. She sat on the low packhorse bridge dangling her legs over the warm stone as she watched the sun go down. When it had disappeared behind the hills, leaving a halo of dark red-gold, it seemed to shine upwards from the depths of the earth and pick out the relief of the heavy grey clouds that massed high above. Insects buzzed on the still, humid air.

  It was an isolated spot, ideal for such business, barely even suitable for cars. During her walk, Sally had enjoyed the peace and the strange tremors of excitement that the anticipation of a storm seemed to lay on the landscape. The colours were richer, the wild flowers and rough grass more vibrant, and the clouds’ shadows seemed palpable masses on the distant valley side.

  But now she was nervous, and she didn’t know why. It was the coming storm, she told herself, the electricity in the air, the isolation, the gathering darkness. Soon the wind would shake the rough moorland grass and rain would lash the dale. It was the perfect place for a secret meeting; she understood that. If they were seen togeth
er, word might get back to the chief inspector and awkward questions would be asked. She wanted to handle this herself, perhaps save a life and catch a killer. Nonetheless, she knew deep down that her shivers were not entirely due to the weather.

  Idly, she cast a loose stone from the bridge into the shallow slow-moving beck. After the rain, she thought, it would be swift, sparkling and ringing with fresh water cascading down the valley side and right under Helmthorpe High Street.

  She looked at her watch. Twenty to ten. Tired of waiting, she wished it was all over. The aftermath of sunset was quickly vanishing as the clouds thickened overhead. A curlew called plaintively in the distance. The place began to feel like a wilderness in a gothic romance. It was creepy, even though she’d been there often enough. A flock of rooks spun across the sky like oily rags. Sally became aware of a new sound throbbing through the silence. A car. She pricked up her ears, cast another stone in the beck and stood to face the track. Yes, she could see the headlights as they dipped and flashed on the winding road. It wouldn’t be long now.

  FIVE

  The storm finally broke at about five a.m. Sharp cracks of thunder woke Banks from a vaguely unpleasant dream. He had a dry mouth and a thick head. So much for control. But at least he hadn’t made a fool of himself; that he remembered.

  Careful not to disturb Sandra, he walked over to the window and looked out on the back garden just in time to see a jagged bolt of lightning streak from north to south across the sky. The first few drops of rain, fat and heavy, came slowly. They burst at intervals on the windowpane and smacked against the slates of the sloping tool shed roof; then they came more quickly and slapped against the leaves of the trees that lined the back alley beyond the garden gate. Soon the rain was coursing down the window and over the slates into the gutter before it gurgled down the drainpipe.