Underworld (16 page)

'He'd like to, I reckon, but he's not exactly Action Man, our Arthur. No, I reckon May would have to start anything if anything were going to start. One thing's certain: Arthur's not spent a night in this house since Billy died else the local CIA would have had it all on tape!'

'So Mr Downey lives by himself?'

'He lodges with his sister and her husband in the next street. He and Billy were big mates, at least Arthur used to tag along behind Billy like a dog. Then Arthur got made up to deputy. Well, that didn't help. They're funny about deputies, this lot, I should know. And not long after, Billy Farr had his accident and had to take a job on the bank. Arthur and him got back to being a bit closer after that maybe, but not much. Billy didn't seem to want to know, really. There was a lot of people reckoned he turned right unsociable after his accident but I always thought he were a lovely man. I was engaged to Col, and while he was away at sea, I used to come round here a lot and we'd look at Col's cards and work out where he was, and Billy used to make a great fuss of me. Me and little Tracey. I always reckoned he'd have liked a daughter of his own.'

'Tracey was the child who disappeared?'

'That's right. You'd know all about that. After that Billy really was unsociable. I don't think I got a kind word out of him from that day on. Nor her either. You'd have thought . . . any road, I thought it'd be different when Col came back, and it was, or mebbe it was the same. We dragged on a bit, but it ended with me giving him his ring back. We were standing on the bridge over the mineral railway. A train went under and I remember he just dropped the ring over into a wagon full of coal. He were always half mad.'

That's my boy, thought Ellie. Ever the symbolist. But never my boy, nor this woman's either, though clearly she still felt some claim.

Another part of her mind had been trying to work out why Stella Mycroft was being so frank with a total stranger. Native Yorkshire tactics were usually to ferret out other people's business and keep quiet about your own. But two things dawned on her.

One was that Stella didn't need to be nosey because by now the local CIA would have programmed everything they could find out about Mrs E. Pascoe into the central computer. The other was that this gratuitous stream of reminiscence was not aimed at bringing her into the life of Burrthorpe but excluding her from it. Look, Stella Mycroft was saying; see how much closer we can be to each other even in our hates and quarrels than you can ever hope to be even in your affections. See how my life has been entwined with Colin's long before you ever set your strange and stranger's eye upon him. Understand that all these odd things that go on in this village have everything to do even with the least important of us who live here and nothing at all to do with an incomer like yourself!

It was a formidable attack, no less destructive because it came from the flank, and probably from the hip. Stella hadn't come round to this house where she was clearly unwelcome to see her 'rival' off. She'd come to find out about Colin.

Typically, Ellie counter-attacked.

'You got bored with waiting for Col to make up his mind, did you?'

'No,' said Stella, unperturbed. 'I'm a good waiter. But I'm not an Arthur Downey. I won't dance around and look ridiculous. I should have known when Col left in the first place how little I figured in his decisions. But I gave him the benefit and waited. Oh, I didn't languish but inside I was waiting. But when he finally came back and I realized that had nowt to do with me either, I said, Sod it! and six months later I married Gavin. Rebound? Mebbe. But you do rebound off a stone wall, don't you, Mrs Pascoe?'

'I see you know my name, Stella,' said Ellie in her best garden-party voice. She felt she was losing on points and needed a space to review tactics.

'Everyone round here knows your name and your husband's name and number too by now,' said Stella viciously, as if suddenly tired of this game. 'And most on 'em can't understand why you don't just bugger off out of it and leave us to look after our own affairs!'

'I'll go when I know whether or not Colin killed that man,' said Ellie spiritedly. 'You've told me what "folk" are saying. What do you say?'

The answer she got was totally unexpected.

'Of course, he bloody killed him!' exploded Stella. 'You may not have known Colin long, but long enough surely to know that one day sooner or later he was bound to kill someone. It's there inside him, have you never felt it? Mebbe it's in his blood, I don't know. But he was bound to kill someone some day, and now it's happened and his only hope is that your man and the other pigs will be too thick to pin it on him. They got so used to fitting up lads who'd done nowt during the Strike, that mebbe they've forgotten how to deal with someone who's so obviously guilty!'

'How can you be so sure?' demanded Ellie. 'I thought you were supposed to be his friend.'

'That's right,' said Stella Mycroft, regarding her with an expression of mocking triumph. 'I'm his friend. And you run to your friends before you run to your teachers. It was me he rang up first last night,
me!
That's how I know he's guilty. Because he bloody well told me so!'

From the doorway there came a crash. Ellie turned. May Farr stood there, her face grey as morning, at her feet the shards of a china cup lying in a pool of amber tea.

Chapter 12

Neville Watmough looked drawn and strained, but it was, when he greeted Pascoe like an old friend, that the detective knew the man was in trouble.

'Peter, come in, how are you?' The use of his first name was a giveaway in itself. The ex-DCC had never felt able to go beyond the formal courtesy of 'Mr Pascoe' in office.

'Let's go into the study, shall we? What about a drink?'

Pascoe couldn't hold back a glance at the mantelshelf where the presentation clock showed it was only twenty to eleven.

'Too early?' laughed Watmough. Time has less significance when you're retired. Coffee, then?'

'No, thank you, sir,' said Pascoe, distrusting all this cosiness.

'Well, sit down anyway. How's everything back at the works? I must drop in sometime soon and have a chat before everyone forgets who I am.'

'I don't think there's much chance of that,' said Pascoe, only conscious of the sarcastic vibrations as he finished the sentence.

'I should explain,' he went on quickly, 'that I'm here on duty.'

'Not a social call, then?' said Watmough, not sounding very surprised.

'No, sir. The point is this. You probably heard on the news about this killing at Burrthorpe Main Colliery last night?'

'Yes. And that you had a man helping with inquiries.'

‘That covers a multitude of possibilities as you know, sir. The thing is, there's a chance that there might be a tie-up here with the Tracey Pedley disappearance.'

'Yes, but that . . . ah.'

Watmough fell silent. It must be hard, after so long responding to any mention of Tracey Pedley with the confident assertion that she was almost certainly one of Donald Pickford's victims, to admit now that the case was still open. Even when you yourself were responsible for undermining your own theory. Or at least publicly responsible.

Pascoe said, 'Incidentally, sir, when did you realize that it was almost impossible for Pickford to have abducted the Pedley girl?'

Watmough said, 'Not while I was still in the Force, if that's what you're thinking. What are they saying down there? That when I realized Pickford actually had made his call that afternoon I hushed it up for fear of looking silly?'

'No, sir,' said Pascoe. 'No one would believe you'd ever shirk your duty.'

Watmough looked taken aback at this assurance.

'No, of course not. I'm glad to hear it. Look, are you sure you won't have that drink? Sorry, you're on duty, aren't you? Well, I'm not any more, so if you don't mind . .'

He went to a bureau and took out a bottle and a glass. It was scotch, Pascoe was interested to note, not the goat-piss sherry for which he was justly infamous. And he didn't have to remove the stopper.

He poured himself a modest measure and returned to his chair.

'No,' he said, 'it wasn't till I started on my articles that I realized that Pickford wouldn't have had the time to . . .no, that sounds as if I had a sudden inspiration, like Sherlock Holmes, doesn't it? It wasn't me at all. It was Monty Boyle who got on to it. He's very impressive in his own way. Very professional.'

'Very elusive,' said Pascoe, ‘I've been trying to get hold of him for a couple of days. Of course, his office would cover for him if he didn't want to see me. But when I rang this morning I got the impression they genuinely didn't know where he was . . .'

He looked at Watmough hopefully.

'Sorry. Can't help. I haven't seen or heard from him since our last so-called creative session last week.'

'No? Tell me, sir, how does it work, this partnership? Boyle updates your stuff with his own research, then knocks it all into
Challenger
shape?'

'More or less,' said Watmough without enthusiasm. 'It was fun at first. Boyle and I got on well. I'd go over my notes with him, then we'd sit and have a drink and chat about old times. He had a tape-recorder so he wouldn't miss anything. He'd obviously done a lot of background research before ever I signed up with the
Challenger
. Almost as if they knew . . . never mind ... but he was thorough. I'll give him that. A damn sight more thorough than your precious Sergeant Wield had been.'

He glared at Pascoe accusingly.

'He carried out his instructions to the letter,' said Pascoe carefully.

'Very loyal of you, Peter. There's a lot of loyalty in Mid-Yorks CID. Perhaps a bit too much on occasion.'

'And what occasion would that be, sir?'

'Nothing. I speak generally. Perhaps bitterly. I'm sorry. But when Boyle told me that Pickford had kept his appointment on the Avro Estate, I felt stupid. I'd been so definite about him being responsible for the Burrthorpe girl's disappearance. Boyle said it didn't matter. The Pickford case would still be presented as my personal triumph. But here we had yet another unsolved case and it was our duty to let the public know. I still wasn't happy. I said that new evidence should be handed over to the police at once. I saw Ogilby. He said the evidence would be handed over simultaneously with its publication in the
Challenger
. That was to be this coming Sunday.'

'Was to be?'

‘Things may have changed with last night's news,' said Watmough.

Pascoe said, 'These allegations that there was some kind of vigilante group in Burrthorpe after the girl disappeared, how much truth is there in them?'

'I don't know. Who's making them?' said Watmough.

Pascoe was taken aback by this superficially disingenuous answer. Was Watmough trying to force from him an admission that he knew the content of the next article? If so, he could have it!

'You are, sir,' he said. 'In the
Challenger
next Sunday.'

For a second Watmough looked blank. Then he smiled wanly and said, 'This sounds like Dalziel.' And then all trace of the smile faded and he looked very old and tired.

'You must think me a very foolish man, Inspector, not to know what's appearing under my name in a Sunday paper,' he said.

'I assume they wouldn't print anything with no grounds at all,' said Pascoe.

'Grounds? If you call idle speculation, airy rumour, retailed over a glass of brandy after a lunch with Monty Boyle, grounds, then grounds there may be. It had never occurred to me that such things plus personal anecdote and even private animosity should provide the main colouring of my memoirs.'

He stood up. It was an effort. Pascoe glanced at the clock. It was just gone eleven. The chimes had not been triggered, he noticed.

'I have got one or two other things . . .' he began.

'I'm sure. Can we make it later? I've got a few things to take care of myself. I'm not being evasive, I assure you. I will be delighted to cooperate fully in helping with your inquiries.'

The wan smile returned as he uttered the ritual phrase.

Pascoe let himself be ushered to the door. Dalziel wouldn't like it, but for once he'd have to lump it.

'Are you just helping out with South's investigation again?' asked Watmough at the door.

'Rather more than that, sir.' Pascoe explained the position.

'So Mr Dalziel is in charge? Well, well. He's by way of being a friend of yours, I believe?'

He couldn't keep the note of interrogation, or perhaps rather of incredulity out of his voice.

'Yes, sir,' said Pascoe simply, not having the two or three hours necessary for an in-depth analysis of the relationship.

'Well, a man must be allowed to make his own friends,' said Watmough. 'As long as he is careful to make his own enemies too.'

How wise, thought Pascoe. If I found that in a Christmas cracker, I'd ask for my money back!

That was a Dalziel type joke, he realized even as it popped into his mind.

And he realized then what Watmough was saying to him.

Chapter 13

'This your missus?' said Detective-Superintendent Dalziel.

'Yes,' said Gavin Mycroft.

'Bonny lass,' said Dalziel, putting the wedding photograph down. 'Suits white. Nice room this, Mr Mycroft. Nice things. Someone's got taste.'

'We don't all keep coal in the bath,' said Mycroft.

His dark good-looking face was watchful, almost sullenly so. He was, Dalziel guessed, about thirty. He had already been interviewed about his encounter with Colin Farr in the pit the previous day. Dalziel had a copy of his statement in his hand.

'Load of rubbish,' he said, waving it.

'What?'

'A lot of the coal we get nowadays. Now, I can remember when I were a lad, a couple of bags of Shillbottle would keep you going nicely for a week in winter, burning hot and steady all the time and going down to nowt more than a fine brown ash. No clinker, or if there were, you'd put it in a box and ask the coalie next time he came if he'd changed his trade and gone into selling hardcore for road-making! Why is it things have got so bad, Mr Mycroft?'

'I don't know. Seems all right to me.'

'You say so? But no! I mean, look at that mucky mark up your chimneybreast. You'd not have got that with the old Shillbottle we used to get before the war.'

He shook his head as he examined the discoloration left by the washing off of Colin Farr's handprints above the fireplace.

Mycroft said, 'We had an accident.'

'An accident? No one hurt, I hope?'

'No. It were nowt. Look, what can I do for you, mister?'

'You can help me,' said Dalziel with a broad beam. This lad, Farr, you know him well?'

'Well enough.'

'And the dead man, Satterthwaite. You'd know him well enough too?'

'Aye.'

'But not well enough to like either of 'em? Or mebbe too well.'

'Hold on? Why d'you say that?'

'Well, one of 'em's dead and the other's suspected of killing him and you don't seem much bothered either way.'

'All right, so we weren't that close. So what?'

'Nothing. I'm glad. It makes you a good witness, unbiased. So I can look for the truth when I ask you this. When you saw Farr on his way out, did he look to you like a man who'd just bashed someone's head in with an iron bar?'

'I didn't notice any blood if that's what you mean.'

'No, I mean his expression, his manner, how did they strike you?'

Mycroft considered.

'Well,' he said, 'he were a bit quiet, that was all.'

'Quiet?'

'Aye. When I asked him what exactly was wrong with him, he didn't give me a row or owt like that, just said his guts were bad and he felt too ill to work.'

'Normally you'd have expected a bit of lip?'

'From Farr? Too true!'

'You in particular, or any deputy?'

'Oh, any deputy,' said Mycroft a little too quickly.

Dalziel scratched his slab of a cheek. Mycroft watched fascinated as if looking for the moving finger to start writing messages.

'And he said he'd been looking for Satterthwaite?' said the fat man finally.

'It's in my statement.'

'Aye, but you don't give his exact words.'

'He said, "I can't find that cunt Satterthwaite, so can you tell him I'm taking an early lowse."'

'Lowse?'

'Knock-off.'

'He didn't like Satterthwaite? Or is cunt a term of endearment round here?'

Mycroft said, 'I don't think they got on too well.'

'Worse than you and Farr?'

'I never said we got on badly!'

'So you didn't. Why'd he not like Satterthwaite?'

'I don't know. They just rubbed each other up the wrong way, I suppose.'

'And you didn't see Satterthwaite any time after you spoke with Farr?'

'No.'

'Would you have expected to?'

'Not necessarily. But I expected to see him in the Cage at knock-off.'

'You usually left the pit together?'

'Not specifically. But officials are entitled to ride ahead of the men.'

'So normally you're all in the first lift? I bet that's popular,' laughed Dalziel. 'But it didn't bother you that Satterthwaite wasn't there?'

'No. Something could easily have come up at the last minute.'

'I know the feeling,' said Dalziel. 'All right, Mr Mycroft, what do you personally think could have happened?'

'I've no idea,' said Mycroft.

'That's funny,' said Dalziel. 'Me neither.'

He went to the sideboard and picked up the framed wedding photograph again.

'Lovely lass, your missus,' he repeated. 'Tell you what, Mr Mycroft. I'm off next to your Welfare Club. Mebbe you could show me the way? And mebbe, just so's I don't break the law, you could even sign me in as a guest so I could try a pint if I happen to get thirsty.'

Mycroft took the photograph from him and said, if you like.'

Outside Dalziel took in a deep draught of the cool air and asked, 'Is it far?'

'Not too far.'

'Then let's walk it, see the sights, eh?'

Ignoring the police car parked outside Mycroft's semi, he set off down the road with the smaller man at his side. The police driver watched them till they were about fifty yards away, then started to drive slowly after them.

As they descended the hill from the new estate their progress was remarked from behind curtains or by oblique glances from passers-by. But when they levelled out into the older central part of the village, where the pebble-dashed semis gave way to brick terraces, the curiosity was blatant to the point of aggressiveness. Mycroft responded by increasing his pace and watching the pavement with a blank stare. Dalziel on the contrary tossed smiles and nods at the onlookers with the all-inclusive beneficence of a pope and appeared unperturbed by the scowls and glowers which bounced back. There were mutterings too, but nothing audible till a round young man with a red face and a beer belly fell into step slightly behind them and said, 'Found your job at last, Gav? Guide dog to the filth!'

Mycroft slowed and would have turned but Dalziel's huge arm urged him irresistibly onward.

'Makes a change from the pickets, us escorting a bobby through the streets, eh, lads?'

This conceit clearly pleased the hearers and several other men fell into step.

'I'll tell you what, Mr Policeman, why are you only talking to bloody deputies?' persued the stout youth, encouraged by the reinforcements. 'What's up wi' the rest on us?'

Dalziel shot him a smile radiant with enough love to convert a cannibal and muttered to Mycroft, 'Who's this comedian?'

'Tommy Dickinson, big mate of Farr's. He's a nothing. All mouth.'

Something of the tone if not the actual wording of this must have reached Dickinson, who said, 'What's that you're muttering, Gav? No use muttering when you're a big important deputy. You've got to shout right loud, so that they can hear you on pit-top, so that your own missus can hear you back in village, even if she's got her knees over her ears!'

Again Mycroft would have stopped. Again Dalziel's arm was stronger than the deputy's anger. By now, attracted by the prospect of a bit of bother, there was a crowd of approaching fifty men in close formation behind the leading trio. Their jeering remarks were still just on the right side of good-natured to a man with a deaf ear and a forgiving temperament. But Tommy Dickinson, feeling the leadership of this small insurrection was at stake, turned up the heat of his personal contribution.

'You'll get nowt but a load of lies from that bugger, Mr Policeman,' he yelled. 'He's got no cause to love Col, except mebbe second-hand cause. What've you got on Col anyway? Nowt! And you can bring in your bloodhounds and your foreskin scientists and you'll still not find owt. And something else, Mr Fat Bloody Policeman: if you're going to say Col didn't get on with Satterthwaite, then you'd better lock up every bugger in this town 'cause none of 'em did, excepting a few arse-lickers like that guide dog of yours. Wuff! wuff! fucking wuff!'

They swept into the small forecourt of the Miners' Social and Welfare Club. A flight of three shallow steps led to the front door which was firmly closed. Dalziel with Mycroft at his side went up the steps while the crowd halted at their foot. Dalziel tried the door, confirmed it was locked, and hammered his clenched fist against the woodwork with sufficient force to impress most of the watchers.

'Fat bugger must be desperate for a drink,' proclaimed Dickinson. 'He'll be out of luck, I reckon. Coppers never pay for their own and Gav there's forgotten where his pocket is. So unless Pedro's feeling generous, you'll have to do without a wet note this shift, Mr Policeman, sir.'

Dalziel turned. His size and elevation permitted him to look over the crowd. He could see his car across the street. His driver had his radio mike at his mouth. Their eyes met. Slowly Dalziel shook his head. His judgement was that this gang were still here for the entertainment, but he knew it wouldn't take much to stir up all the residual distrust and dislike of the police into a riot. The sound of fast approaching sirens might be enough. 'What are you shaking tha head at, mister?' demanded

Dickinson. 'Are you calling me a liar like you called my marra a liar?"

'Nay,' said Dalziel, 'I don't know about your marra, lad, but as for you, aye, certainly I'm calling you a liar.'

A great silence fell, broken only by the sounds of the Club door being unbolted and unlocked whose beginnings Dalziel had caught a few moments earlier. The men were looking at Tommy Dickinson. It was his show. He'd been given a cue which in normal circumstances could only be answered by violence or at least its threat. If he took a swing at Dalziel now, the whole village would probably explode. Dickinson hesitated, not through any weighing and assessing of action and consequence, but simply because he suddenly became aware that for the first time in his working life, he was Number One, the team leader, the man everyone was looking to for a lead. He felt the onset of stage-fright. At this point Neil Wardle, who had just joined the onlookers, called from the back, 'Don't be daft, Tommy. It's not worth it,' and began forcing his way forward.

Wardle's words did what cries of encouragement might have failed to do. To back away now was probably to back out of the limelight for ever. Putting his foot on the lower step, he clenched his fists and twisting his amiable features into as ferocious an expression as possible he said, 'You'd best take that back, you fat bastard.'

Nay,' said Dalziel, all injured, 'I'll call any man a liar who says I can't get a drink anywhere in Yorkshire.'

Behind him the door opened and Pedro Pedley said, 'What the hell's going on here? Who the hell are you?'

'Detective-Superintendent Andrew Dalziel, and I want a drink.'

'Well, you can't have one,' growled Pedley. 'First we're not open, that's the Law; and second you're not a member, that's the Rules.'

'Now hang on,' said Dalziel. 'We'll soon put that right. First you are open 'cause I am the Law, and second I'm here as a guest of a member, and them's the Rules.'

'Whose guest? Yours, Gav?'

'What? Drink with a deputy?' cried Dalziel indignantly. 'What are you saying, lad? No, I'm the personal guest of my friend Mr Dickinson here. Come on, Tommy. Get me signed in before I die of thirst.'

And stooping, he swung the sixteen stone of the amazed miner up on to the top step beside him and, with a fraternal arm round his shoulder, urged him through the door.

'Here, Pedro, are you really open?' called a voice.

Pedro shrugged and said, 'Looks like it.'

'Well, fuck me. Just goes to show, nowt's completely useless, not even a cop!'

There was a roar of appreciative laughter and the men poured over the threshold, jostling and joking.

Soon only Neil Wardle remained.

'Not coming in, Neil?' asked Pedley. 'We'll not get into bother, not with that fat bugger in there.'

'I reckon he may be more bother than this town's ever known,' said Wardle slowly. 'Pedro, how's Maggie?'

'She's gone off to stay with her mam in Barnsley. It'll probably kill the old lass. She thought the sun shone out of Harold's arsehole. She never had as much time for Maggie and reckoned she got what she deserved when she got me. I think she blamed us both for what happened when . . . you know, our Tracey. Mebbe they can comfort each other this time.'

'I didn't know it was like that,' said Wardle. 'I'm sorry.’

Pedro, you realize they'll probably start talking about Tracey again, the cops, and everyone.'

'That's another good reason for having Maggie out of the way,' said Pedley. 'Me, I can take it. If I snap I'll just thump some bugger. Maggie could go right over the edge if she had to go through that again.'

'It's a pig of a world, Pedro,' said Wardle.

From inside came a cry. 'If this place is open, why's there no bugger serving drink?'

'Someone should tell that lot in there,' said Pedley bitterly.

'Never fear,' said Wardle. 'Living round here, most on 'em will find out for themselves sooner or later. Let's get inside, Pedro. I think I'd like a closer look at that fat cop. He'll bear watching, that one, and I don't want Tommy talking himself any deeper in trouble.'

'You reckon he's in trouble, do you?' asked Pedley, leading the way through into the bar.

'The way that bugger picked him up like he'd been tickling a trout?' said Wardle. 'Oh yes. He's ready to be buttered and fried, is Tommy, and served up for breakfast with a sprig of parsley in his gills!'