Deadheads (35 page)

'No, that night, after we got back from your place, I couldn't sleep. I went to bed, but in the end I had to get up. I was sitting out here half the night drinking whisky. It was a strange feeling to have after such a lovely day. A sense of some horrible happening being quite close. You can believe me or not,' she said defiantly.

'And Patrick? Did he have this premonition too?' asked Pascoe with sudden interest.

'No.' Daphne laughed. 'He slept solidly, till I woke him getting back into bed about four. Then we had to get up again so
he
could have a drink. Then we sat out here and drank and talked for another hour or so.'

She blushed faintly as she spoke and Ellie guessed that conversation wasn't all that had passed between them on the terrace.

'I slept all the way to Gloucester,' concluded Daphne. 'I was still yawning when I met the headmaster and the staff, I'm afraid.'

'That's all right,' said Ellie. 'In those places the teachers are used to that reaction to their presence.'

'Tut-tut,' said Pascoe, filled with relief at what he'd just heard. Surely even Dalziel would admit this unsolicited alibi? 'I think I'll go and have a word with Patrick, if you'll excuse me.'

He found Aldermann hard at work in his rose-garden.

'Hello, Peter,' he said. 'I didn't know you'd arrived. I'm sorry to have been so unhostly.'

'That's OK. No, don't stop. It's nice down here.'

'There's really such a lot to do,' said Aldermann, still apologizing. 'That storm the other night - it must have been the night you were in the house - such damage!'

All the time he talked the silver blade of the pruning knife was moving with swift economy around the rose branches, severing broken twigs and damaged blooms which were then popped into the canvas bag slung around his neck.

'And now, of course, you're minus your gardeners,' said Pascoe.

'Yes, that's almost the worst thing,' said Aldermann. 'I was flabbergasted. Caldicott! Why, he's been coming to Rosemont ever since he was a boy. And his father before him was with Uncle Eddie from the beginning.'

'It was Brent, the son, who was the trouble, it seems,' said Pascoe. 'He had a bit of a record, nothing serious, but that's how he met Arthur Marsh when they were in the nick together. Later Arthur had this bright idea. It
was
quite bright, I suppose.'

'But how did they get old Caldicott to go along with it?'

'Feeling the pinch, I suppose. Everyone's been cutting back lately, wanting Caldicott to come half a day a week instead of a full day, but expecting much the same work. It's easy to start resenting their big, comfortable houses and all the goodies you glimpse through doors and windows. Marsh saw other things - alarm systems, sensor locations, bypass switches, wiring circuits - he's a trained electrician and there's plenty of written material about these systems nowadays. They were able to do such neat jobs, not being hurried and working in daylight, that often it wasn't till the owners got home, sometimes days later, that the break-in was discovered.'

'I still find it hard to believe, or forgive. I certainly never cut back on their time here.'

No, you wouldn't thought Pascoe.

He said, 'Caldicott senior did say as much. He's the one who's cracked and coughed the lot. He hadn't wanted to do Rosemont. That's where the business had really started, he said, and you were that rare thing among employers, a
real
gardener rather than just a flash Harry wanting to put on a show.'

'He said that?' Aldermann looked pleased. 'Well, I'll have to find someone else now, of course. It was quite a shock. But then this other business of Dick Elgood - that was really devastating. You've heard, of course?'

'Yes,' said Pascoe. 'I've heard.'

'Poor Dick. It's such a tragic waste. But then, so much of his life was, wasn't it?'

'He looked very successful to me,' said Pascoe.

'Did he? Yes, I suppose he would. And I dare say that's how he thought of himself too. But I doubt if he was really a
happy
man. I honestly believe that in Nature there's only one true course of development for each of us, and the trick is finding it. At some point Dick took a wrong road. Like a rose-tree. You can cut and trim it away from its true growth and be quite successful with it for a long time. But in the end, the misdirection shows.'

'What will happen at Perfecta now?' asked Pascoe.

'I don't know. It's all in the melting-pot. There'll be changes, I expect, but nothing ever really changes.'

Patrick Aldermann spoke with the confident disinterest of one who knows where the real centre of things lies: And why should he not? Had not life confirmed his judgement at every turn? Some might have called him an opportunist, but opportunity so invariably offered must assume the dimension of fate. There had been no doubt in his mind this lunch-time, for instance, that when he went to Perfecta he would find that Quayle had already assumed the mantle of acting chairman and managing director, and in that capacity had installed himself in Elgood's office. It hadn't even been necessary to find a pretext for getting him to open the safe. A stricken Miss Dominic had already opened it at his behest. And just as inevitably, the plain white envelope which Patrick had picked out and pocketed had contained the original of his Great-Aunt Florence's will. This was no opportunism but destiny! With such assurance of maintaining the true order of things, where for instance had been the risk in wandering into Elgood's cottage as the departing guests crowded the little garden outside to make their goodbyes, pulling down the attic ladder, ascending and depositing the cardboard box with bottle tops slightly loosened into the open cistern? Three minutes. No one had noticed he'd gone. So it had always been. So, he assumed, it would always be. Beyond choice. Beyond morality. Preordained.

He became aware that Pascoe was observing him curiously. And not only Pascoe. His son was standing close behind the policeman, almost invisible in the camouflage of sun-flecks through the breeze-stirred roses.

'Hello, David,' said Aldermann, resuming his pruning. 'What are you up to.'

'Mummy sent me to say it's rude for you to keep Mr Pascoe standing out here so long.'

'And she's right, of course. Thank you, David. Peter, I'm sorry.'

‘It was my idea,' said Pascoe.

'That's no excuse,' said Aldermann, slicing another bloom off its stem with a single economic motion which set the sunlight spilling off the silver blade like alien blood.

'Daddy,' said the boy.

'Yes, David.'

'What is it that you're doing? I mean, I can see what you're doing, but why do you do it?'

'Well,' said Aldermann with his knife poised above another deadhead. 'I'm . . .'

Then he paused and smiled as if at some deep, inner joke.

Carefully he closed the pruning knife and put it in his pocket.

'Later, David,' he said. 'I'll explain to you some other time. We have our guests to look after. Peter, you must be roasted, standing out here in the sun. Let's go and find a cool drink and sit and talk to the ladies. Isn't it a perfect day?'