Dalziel 09 Child's Play Page 3

  'Cliff,' said the young man sullenly, 'Cliff Sharman.'

  Wield switched on the table lamp and the corners of the room sprang into view. None was a pretty sight, but in one of them stood an old folding chair.

  'All right, Cliff,' said Wield. 'Why don't you pull up that chair and let's sit down together for a few minutes and have a bit of a chat, shall we?'

  Chapter 3

  As soon as Pascoe walked through the door, his daughter began to cry.

  'You're late,' said Ellie.

  'Yes, I know. I'm a detective. They teach us to spot things like that.'

  'And that's Rosie crying.'

  'Is it? I thought maybe we'd bought a wolf.'

  He took off his jacket, draped it over the banisters and ran lightly up the stairs.

  The little girl stopped crying as soon as he entered her room. This was a game she'd started playing only recently. That it was a game was beyond doubt; Ellie had observed her deep in sleep till her father's key turned in the lock, and then immediately she let out her summoning wail and would not be silent till he came and spoke to her. What he said didn't matter.

  Tonight he said, 'Hi, kid. Remember last week I was telling you I should be hearing about my promotion soon? Well, the bad news is, I still haven't, so if you've been building up any hopes of getting a new pushchair or going to Acapulco this Christmas, forget it. Want some advice, kid? If you feel like whizzing, don't start unless you can keep it up. Nobody loves a whizz-kid that's stopped whizzing! Did I hear you ask me why I've stopped? Well, I've narrowed it down to three possibilities. One: they all think I'm Fat Andy's boy and everyone hates Fat Andy. Two: your mum keeps chaining herself to nuclear missile sites and also she's Membership Secretary of WRAG. So what? you say. WRAG is non-aligned politically, you've read the hand-outs. But what does Fat Andy say? He says WRAG's middle-of-the-road like an Italian motorist. All left-hand drive and bloody dangerous! Three? No, I've not forgotten three. Three is, maybe I'm just not good enough, what about that? Maybe inspector's my limit. What's that you said? Bollocks? You mean it? Gee, thanks, kid. I always feel better after talking to you!'

  Gently he laid the once more sleeping child back on her bed and pulled the blanket up over her tiny body.

  Downstairs he went first into the kitchen and poured two large Scotch-on-the-rocks. Then he went through into the living-room.

  In his brief absence his wife had lost her clothes and gained a newspaper.

  'Have you seen this?' she demanded.

  'Often,' said Pascoe gravely. 'But I have no objection to seeing it again.'

  'This,' she said, brandishing the Mid-Yorks Evening Post.

  'I've certainly seen one very like it,' he said, 'It was in my jacket pocket, but it can hardly be the same one, can it? I mean your well-known views on the invasion of privacy would hardly permit you to go through your husband's pockets, would they?'

  'It was sticking out.'

  'That's all right, then. You're equally well known for your support of a wife's right to grab anything that's sticking out. What am I looking at? This Kemble business. Well, the chap who got kicked is going to be all right, but he can't remember a thing. And Wield's looking into the graffiti. Now why don't you put the paper down . . .'

  'No, it wasn't the Kemble story I wanted you to look at. It was this.''

  Her finger stabbed an item headed Unusual Will.

  Published today, the will of the late Mrs Gwendoline Huby of Troy House, Greendale, makes interesting reading. The bulk of her estate whose estimated value is in excess of one million pounds is left to her only son, Alexander Lomas Huby, who was reported missing on active service in Italy in 1944. Lieutenant Huby's death was assumed though his body was never found. In the event that he does not appear to claim his inheritance by his ninetieth birthday in the year 2015 the estate will be divided equally between the People's Animal Welfare Society, the Combined Operations Dependant's Relief Organization, both registered charities in which Mrs Huby had a long interest, and Women For Empire, a social-political group which she had supported for many years.

  'Very interesting,' said Pascoe. 'Sad too. Poor old woman.'

  'Stupid old woman!' exclaimed Ellie.

  'That's a bit hard. OK, she must have been a bit dotty, but . . .'

  'But nothing! Don't you see? A third of her estate to Women for Empire! More than a third of a million pounds!'

  'Who,' wondered Pascoe, sipping one of the scotches, 'are Women for Empire?'

  'My God. No wonder they're dragging their feet about promoting you to Chief Inspector! Fascists! Red, white and blue, and cheap black labour!'

  'I see,' said Pascoe feeling the crack about his promotion was a little under the belt. 'Can't say I've ever heard of them.'

  'So what? You'd never heard of Bangkok massage till you married me.'

  'That's true. But I'd still like to know which of my worldwide sources of intelligence I can blame for my ignorance. Where did you hear about them?'

  Ellie blushed gently. It was a phenomenon observed by few people as the change of colour was not so much in her face as in the hollow of her throat, the rosy flush seeping down towards the deep cleft of her breasts. Pascoe claimed that here was the quintessence of female guilt, i.e. evidence of guilt masquerading as a mark of modesty.

  'Where?' he pressed.

  'On the list,' she muttered.

  'List?'

  'Yes,' she said defiantly. 'There's a list of ultra-right-wing groups we ought to keep an eye open for. We got a copy at WRAG.'

  'A list!' said Pascoe taking another drink. 'You mean, like the RC's Index? Forbidden reading for the faithful? Or is it more like the Coal Board's famous hit-list? These organizations are the pits and ought to be closed down?'

  'Peter, if you don't stop trying to be funny, I'll get dressed again. And incidentally, why are you drinking from both those glasses?'

  'Sorry,' said Pascoe handing over the fuller of the two. ‘Incidentally in return, how come at nine-thirty in the evening you're wearing nothing but the Evening Post anyway?'

  'Every night for what seems weeks now you've been staggering in late. Rosie instantly sets up that awful howl and you stagger upstairs to talk to her. I dread to think what long-term effect these little monologues are having on the child!'

  'She doesn't complain.'

  'No. It's the only way she can get your attention for a little while. That's what all this is about. The next stage is for you to stagger back downstairs, have a couple of drinks, eat your supper and then fall asleep beyond recall by anything less penetrative than Fat Andy's voice. Well, tonight I'm getting in my howl first!'

  Pascoe looked at her thoughtfully, finished his drink and leaned back on the sofa.

  'Howl away,' he invited.

  The Unusual Will item had caught other eyes that day too.

  The Mid-Yorks Evening Post was one of several northern local papers in the Challenger group. The Challenger itself was a Sunday tabloid, published in Leeds with a mainly northern circulation though in recent years under the dynamic editorship of Ike Ogilby it had made some inroads into the Midlands. Nor did Ogilby's ambitions end at Birmingham. In the next five years he aimed either to expand the Challenger into a full-blown national or use it as his personal springboard to an established editorial chair in Fleet Street, he didn't much care which.

  The other editors within the group were requested to bring to Ogilby's notice any local item which might interest the Challenger. In addition Ogilby, who trusted his fellow journalists to share a story like the chimpanzee trusts its fellow chimps to share a banana, encouraged his own staff to scan the evening columns.

  Henry Vollans, a young man who had recently joined the staff from a West Country weekly, spotted the piece about the Huby will at half past five. Boldly he took it straight to Ogilby who was preparing to go home. The older man, who admired cheek and recognized ambition to match his own, said dubiously, 'Might be worth a go. What were you thinking of? Sob piece? Poor old mam,
lost child, that sort of thing?'

  'Maybe,' said Vollans who was slim, blond and tried not unsuccessfully to look like Robert Redford in All the Presidents' Men. 'But this lot, Women For Empire, that rang a bell. There was a letter in the correspondence column a couple of weeks back when I was sorting them out. From a Mrs Laetitia Falkingham. I checked back and it had the heading. She lives at Ilkley and calls herself the founder and perpetual president of Women For Empire. The letter was about that bother in Bradford schools. She seemed to think it could be solved by sending all the white kids to Eton and educating the blacks under the trees in the public parks. I checked through the files. Seems she's been writing to the paper off and on for years. We've published quite a few.'

  'Yes, of course. Rings a bell now,' said Ogilby. 'Sounds nicely batty, doesn't she? OK. Check it out to see if there's anything there for us. But I suspect the doting mum/lost kid angle will be the best. This racial vandal stuff at the Kemble theatre looks more interesting.'

  'Could be if there's some bother on the opening night,' said Vollans. 'Shall I go? I could do a review anyway.'

  'Theatre correspondent too,' mocked Ogilby, admiring the young man's pushiness. 'Why not? But talk to me again before you do anything on Mrs Falkingham. We're treading very warily about Bradford.'

  Bradford's large and growing Asian community had highlighted by reversal the problems of mixed race schooling. It was the usual question of how best to cater for the classroom needs of a minority, only in this case the minority was frequently white. The Challenger's natural bent was conservative, but Ogilby wasn't about to alienate thousands of potential readers right on his doorstep.

  'OK, Henry,' said Ogilby dismissively. 'Well spotted.'

  Vollans left, so pleased with himself that he forgot his Robert Redford walk for several paces.

  Nor did interest in the will end there.

  A few hours later the telephone was answered in a flat in north Leeds, quite close to the University. The conversation was short and guarded.

  'Yes?'

  'Something in the Mid-Yorks Evening Post that might interest. Women For Empire, that daft Falkingham woman's little tea-circle out at Ilkley, could be in for a windfall.'

  'I know.'

  'Oh.'

  'Yes. You're way behind, as usual. All that's long taken care of.'

  'Oh. Sorry I spoke.'

  'No, you were right. You're in a call-box?'

  'Natch!'

  'Good. But don't make a habit of calling. 'Bye.'

  'And up yours too,' said the caller disgruntledly into the dead phone. 'Condescending cunt!'

  Not far away in the living-room of his small suburban flat, Sergeant Wield too reclined on a sofa but he was wide awake, the Evening Post with its news of wills and vandals lay unopened on the hall floor, and the ice cubes in his untouched Scotch had long since diluted the rich amber to a pale straw.

  He was thinking about Maurice Eaton. And he was marvelling that he had managed to think so little about him for so long. Lovers beneath the singing sky of May, they had even wandered once close to the decision, momentous in that time and at that place and in those circumstances, of openly setting up house together. Then Maurice, a Post Office executive, had been transferred north to Newcastle.

  It had seemed a Godsent compromise solution at the time - close enough for regular meetings but far enough to reduce the decision on setting up house to a problem of geography.

  But even small distances work large disenchantments.

  Wield had once been proud of his fierce fidelity but now he saw it as a form of naive self-centredness. He recalled with amazement and shame his near-hysterical outburst of jealous rage when Maurice had finally admitted he was seeing somebody else. For thirty minutes he had been the creature of the emotions he had controlled for as many years. And he had never seen Maurice again since that day.

  The only person who ever got a hint of what he had gone through was Mary, his sister. They had never spoken openly of Wield's sexuality, but a bond of loving understanding existed between them. Two years after the break with Maurice, she had left Yorkshire too when her husband was made redundant and decided that Canada held more hope for his family than this British wasteland.

  So now Wield was alone. And had remained alone, despite all temptation, treating the core of his physical and emotional being as if it were some physiological disability, like alcoholism, requiring total abstinence for control.

  There had been small crises. But from the first second he had heard Sharman's voice on the phone, he had felt certain that this was the start of the last battle.

  He went over their conversation again, as he might have gone over an interrogation transcript in the Station.

  'Where'd you meet Maurice?' he'd asked.

  'In London.'

  'London?'

  'Yeah. He moved down from the North a couple of years back, didn't you know that?'

  It was a redundant question, the boy knew the answer. Wield said, 'New job? Is he still with the Post Office?'

  'British Telecom now. Onward and upward, that's Mo.'

  'And he's . . . well?'

  Perhaps he shouldn't have let the personal query, however muted, slip out. The boy had smiled as he replied, 'He's fine. Better than ever before, that's what he says. It's different down there, see. Up North, it may be the 'eighties in the calendar, but there's still a ghetto mentality, know what I mean? I'm just quoting Mo, of course. Me, this is the first time I've got further north than Wembley!'

  'Oh aye? Why's that?'

  'Why's what?'

  'Why've you decided to explore, lad? Looking for Solomon's mines, is it?'

  'Sorry? Coal mines, you mean?'

  'Forget it,' said Wield. 'Just tell us why you've come.'

  The boy hesitated. Wield read this as a decision-making pause, choosing perhaps between soft-sell and hard-sell, between free-loading and blackmail.

  'Just fancied a change of scene,' said Sharman at last. 'Mo and me decided to have a bit of a hol from each other...’

  'You were living together?'

  'Yeah, natch.' The youth grinned knowingly. 'You two never managed that, did you? Always scared of the neighbours, Mo said. That's why he likes it down there. No one gives a fuck who's giving a fuck!'

  'So you decided to take a trip to Yorkshire and see me?' said Wield.

  'No! I just set off hitching and today I got dumped here and the name of the place rang a bell and I said, hello, why not get in touch with Mo's old mate and say hello? That's all.'

  He didn't sound very convincing, but even if he had, Wield was not in a convincible mood. Hitch-hikers didn't get dropped at bus-stations.

  He said, 'So Maurice told you all about me?'

  'Oh yes,' said Sharman confidently. 'He was showing me some old photos in bed one night and I said, Who's that? and he told me all about you and the thing you had together and having to keep it quiet because you were a cop and all that!'

  The real pain came at that moment, the pain of betrayal, sharp and burning still as on that first occasion, an old wound ripping wide.

  'It's always nice to hear from old friends,' said Wield softly. 'How long are you planning staying, Cliff?'

  'Don't know,' said the boy, clearly puzzled by this gentle response. 'Might as well take a look round now I'm here, see the natives sort of thing. I'll need to find somewhere to kip, not too pricey though. Any suggestions?'

  The first squeeze? Well, he had to sleep somewhere and it made sense to keep a close eye on him till the situation got clearer. Wield examined this conclusion for self-deceiving edges, but quickly gave up. You didn't devote your life to deceiving others without becoming expert at deceiving yourself.

  'You can sleep on my couch tonight,' he had said.

  'Can I? Thanks a million,' said the boy with a smile which hovered between gratitude and triumph. 'I promise I'll curl up so small that you'll hardly know I'm there at all.'

  But he was there, in the bathroom, splas
hing and singing like a careless child. Wield was acutely aware of his presence. His existence had been monastic for a long time. There had been another dark-skinned boy, a police cadet, who had ambushed his affections against his will, but nothing had come of it, and the cadet had been posted away. Sharman reminded him of that boy and he knew that, if anything, the danger was even greater now than then. But the danger to what? His way of life? What kind of life was it that a simple surge of desire put at risk?

  The youth's bag was lying on the floor. More to distract himself than anything else, Wield leaned forward, unzipped it and began to examine the contents. There wasn't much. Some clothes, shoes, a couple of paperbacks and a wallet.

  He opened the wallet. It contained about sixty or seventy pounds in fivers. In the other pocket were two pieces of paper. One had some names and telephone numbers scribbled on it. One name leapt out of the page. Mo. He made a note of the number and turned his attention to the other piece of paper. This was a timetable for coaches from London to the North. A departure time was underlined and the arrival time in Yorkshire. The latter was about ten minutes before Sharman's call to the Station. The little bastard hadn't hung about. So much for his talk of arriving here by chance!

  He heard the water running from the bath. Quickly he returned everything to the bag. He had no doubt that Sharman would emerge all provocatively naked and he rehearsed his own coldly scornful response as he demanded explanations.

  The door opened. The boy came into the room, his hair spiky from washing, his slim brown body enveloped in Wield's old towelling robe.

  'God, I enjoyed that,' he said. 'Any chance of some cocoa and a choc biscuit?'

  He sat on the sofa, curling his feet up beneath him. He looked little more than fourteen and as relaxed and uncalculating as a tired puppy.

  Wield tried not to admit to himself he was postponing a confrontation but he knew that it was already postponed. By his old standards this was a mistake. But he had felt all the old parameters of duty and action begin to thaw and resolve the moment Pascoe had said there was a call for Mac Wield.

  One word, one phone call. How could something so simple be allowed to change a whole life? He stood and went to put the kettle on.