Dalziel And Pascoe: Pictures Of Perfection Part 29

'Why not just tell the police?'

'Because it was quite clear to me who had painted this and I had no desire to involve the country's best young artist in a forgery scandal at the outset of her career.'

She regarded him sceptically.

'But now they know.'

'They worked it out for themselves. One should never underestimate the pedestrian mind. It's walking slowly that gives you the best view of the countryside. However, merely sign your name to this and it (a) ceases to be a forgery and (b) increases its potential value to me.'

'But what about the original? Don't you want it back?'

'No. It's Fran's by right. She should have had it last year when Daddy died. Was that someone downstairs?'

Caddy went to the door and called, 'h.e.l.lo?'

There was no answer and she said, 'No, just the boards warming up in this sunshine.'

'Yes, it does ease old joints rather, doesn't it? Where's Kee? She wasn't downstairs, so I came straight up.'

'She went up to the vicarage.'

'Really? Interesting but worrying. To embrace religion is a definite step on the path to spinsterhood.'

'I don't think it's religion she's after embracing,' said Caddy with her wicked grin.

'What? You mean his reverence? I got the impression from Mrs Bayle, the Hecate of Ens...o...b.. who gathers weekly reports from all the weird sisterhood, that Larry, our pastoral lamb, was bleating after you.'

'He'll get over it,' she said with the confidence of one not unfamiliar with the recuperative powers of suitors brought to the edge of death by her indifference. 'Kee's far better at that sort of thing than me.'

'And she's told you that she loves him?'

'Of course not. Kee never tells me anything she thinks might make me worry about the future.'

'And would her marrying the Vicar make you worry?'

'Not really. I'm sure they'd come up with some ingenious scheme for letting me paint in the vestry. But it would cause Kee a lot of problems. She may not know it, but she's the kind who'd like a houseful of kids. That she might feel she's got to give up because looking after me is a full-time maternal job.'

'But why not tell her you can look after yourself ?'

She laughed joyously.

'Come on, Justin! After Kee, you know me better than anyone. In fact, artistically speaking, you know me best of all. So you know that after six months of looking after myself I'd have either died of food poisoning or been arrested for non-payment of bills. No, I'll need to be taken into care if Kee is going to have any chance of the life she deserves.'

She was looking at him expectantly.

He said, 'I'm not sure what you're getting at. . .'

'Last time we met I was pretty sure what you were getting at.'

'Caddy, yes, that was an aberration, compounded I fear by my egotistical reaction . ..'

'Hold on. Are you saying you really didn't want to screw me?'

'No, I mean, yes, of course, but no, not so brutally...'

'You mean that really, deep down, you respect me?' she mocked.

'Yes. In fact, I do.'

'I believe you,' she said. 'That's always been what's made you bearable under the c.r.a.p, Justin. You know what I'm about, sometimes you're way ahead of me. But that doesn't stop my t.i.ts from turning you h.o.r.n.y. Look, you have to understand, that stuff doesn't mean all that much to me. Maybe some day, but not yet. Which doesn't mean to say that I simply lie back and think of England. But this would always come first. Any time and every time. Are you with me?'

She made a gesture which took in her studio and all that was in it.

'I think so,' he said cautiously. 'You'd like me to act as, er, your patron . . . ?'

'Patron? h.e.l.l, no. I don't want patronized. I want to be cosseted, comforted, guided, encouraged. Could you manage that, Justin?'

'I believe so,' he said. He looked again at the portrait of Wield, 'In fact it would be a privilege.'

'And one privilege deserves another,' said Caddy.

She crossed her hands on the bottom hem of her long, loose smock and in a single swift movement pulled it over her head to leave herself naked from the waist up. The zip on her jeans seemed to fly open of its own volition and she peeled them easily off her strong brown legs.

Halavant's mouth fell open and he did a little involuntary skip backwards.

'No time for dancing, Justin,' she said. 'This is a workshop, not a preview. If Kee doesn't have her wicked way with the Vicar, she could be back any moment.'

For a moment Halavant hesitated, but only for a moment. There is a tide, and his was so close to neaping, there was no time to waste. Rapidly he stripped off his elegant clothes. There was of course nowhere to hang them so, trying to miss the more obviously damp patches, he dropped them on the floor. From here on in, life, he guessed, would be full of such sacrifices. But full too of, oh, such rewards!

'You look almost ready to start without me?' she mocked. 'Will it be all right here, or do you have a thing about doing it on the stairs?'

She flung open the door as she spoke.

Jason Toke, crouched on the narrow landing, leapt to his feet like a beast of the forest startled by the beater's drums. For a moment he stared at the naked figures before him, then with a cry so high-pitched as to be almost inaudible, he fled down the stairs and out of the Gallery. On the landing floor lay the Renoir catalogue.

'What the h.e.l.l did he want?' cried Halavant.

'Nothing,' said Caddy. 'Just to give me a present. I don't think he'll be back.'

'You're sure?'

'Does it matter?'

'Not in the least.'

'Then what are we waiting for?' said Caddy Scudamore.

CHAPTER XI.

'The Complaint I find is not considered Incurable nowadays, provided the Patient be young enough not to have the Head hardened.'

As Dalziel and his two subordinates strode back up the High Street, they saw the door of the Eendale Gallery burst open and Jason Toke come hurtling out.

Wield called, 'Jason!' but the youth went running by, his pale, wild face giving no sign that he either saw or heard the policemen.

Wield halted and said, 'Shall I go after him?'

'What the h.e.l.l for?' growled Dalziel. 'Didn't you just say yon blabbermouth Digweed doesn't want to press charges?'

'There's still the kingfisher,' said Pascoe.'

'Oh aye. Crime of the sodding century. That reminds me. This Toke's a gun freak, isn't he? Well, Forensic said to pa.s.s a message to whichever of you two b.u.g.g.e.rs gave them the bird, it weren't shot with a bullet but summat more like an arrow. So it's not Toke you want, it's the ancient f.u.c.king mariner! Let's just concentrate on our wandering ploughboy, shall we?'

They reached Dalziel's car, still parked outside the cafe. Pascoe looked across at the Gallery, noted the aubergine cabriolet parked there, and murmured, 'I wonder what he was running from? Perhaps we should take a look.'

Without waiting for the Fat Man's approval, he crossed over and stepped through the still-open door of the Gallery. The door behind the counter was open too and he could hear noises on the stairway. He listened carefully for a few seconds then retreated, closing the door behind him very quietly.

'Everything OK?' said Dalziel sarcastically. 'No blood on the walls?'

'No, sir. Everything seemed tickety-boo,' said Pascoe.

'Grand. Get in. You too, Sergeant, pardon me for breaking your trance.'

'I were just thinking about that arrow, sir .. . Yes, sir, I'm getting in!'

His nearest and dearest knew that when Dalziel let out a certain kind of minotaurine roar, discussion was useless and delay might be fatal. As Wield slipped into the back seat of the car he glanced up and glimpsed Digweed's narrow figure at the bookshop's upper window. Their gazes met, momentarily engaged, then the car was moving and Wield was struggling to close the door.

Digweed had watched their approach up the street with considerable unease. Wield's precise motives for covering up his crime were not all that clear, yet he did not antic.i.p.ate he would change his mind. On the other hand, that tun of lard he worked under looked capable of sniffing out irregularities like a pig after truffles. So it was with some relief he saw the car move off.

With fear of imminent arrest removed, he was able to let his thoughts once more refocus on what had happened that morning. No, focus was the wrong word. There was nothing so sharp happening in his mind, just a turbulence of puzzlement, hope, trepidation, antic.i.p.ation, and downright fear.

He heard the phone ring in the computer room, then the tone to signal the fax machine was engaged.

He allowed the sounds to toll him back from these perilous seas to the real world, though in what sense words fed into a machine many miles away and somehow spewed out into his office should be realler than his own deepest hopes and fears, he couldn't say.

Wield too meditated on the implications of the cover-up as Dalziel turned into the lane that ran past Corpse Cottage to the vicarage.

He tried to soothe his dyspeptic conscience with the Fat Man's frequent a.s.sertion that, the way the CPS threw out perfectly good cases that had cost overworked detectives many sleepless hours, it made more sense morally, socially and legally to leave justice in the hands of a rational, informed intelligence such as his own.

Dalziel's precise words were, 'Them w.a.n.kers couldn't spot a bishop in a brothel. You get more sense from a p.i.s.sed parrot.'

But even in the vernacular this oracular utterance brought little comfort. There was in Wield a strong streak of puritanism which did not take kindly to the feeling that however you dressed them up, his motives had been personal, private and self-indulgent. All right, the goods had been recovered, no real harm done, Digweed wasn't going to re-offend, and so on, and so on.

But beneath all this he knew that if Digweed hadn't been gay . . . no, even that was an evasion, making himself out to be some brave crusader for gay rights; this was far more personal ... if he hadn't surprised in himself an inexplicable liking for the man, he'd have fingered his collar, and let Andy Dalziel and the CPS decide what happened next.

According to the trick cyclists, such an admission or recognition ought to have been cathartic. It wasn't.

They paused briefly at Corpse Cottage but found it deserted.

'Where's that useless b.u.g.g.e.r Filmer?' demanded Dalziel.

Pascoe, who was beginning to suspect he had been less than just to the section sergeant, said, 'He has got rather a lot on his plate, sir.'

'Aye, that figures for a b.u.g.g.e.r who wouldn't know kippers from custard,' said Dalziel. 'Let's not hang about. If Sherlock here's right, it's murder at the vicarage after all.'

'Hardly murder, sir,' objected Pascoe mildly.

'We'll see about that,' said Dalziel with a promissory snarl.

But when they reached the vicarage, it too was deserted, or at least there was no reply to their urgent a.s.sault on the front door.

Wield led the way round the side and Dalziel was about to work the same rough magic on the french window as he'd done on the walled garden door when Wield said, 'Sir!'

'What?' said the Fat Man. 'Jesus, he's got lift-off!'

The Sergeant had reached up into an old beech tree and swung himself with gymnastic agility on to a low bough to give him a view over the churchyard wall.

Moving through the grey forest of memorial stone he glimpsed three figures, one female, two male, and one of the males had bright red hair.

'There they are,' he said. 'Stop in the name of the law!'

He dropped lightly to the ground to be met by the amazed stares of the other two.

'I don't believe this,' said Dalziel. 'Did he really shout that?'

'Wieldy, are you all right?' said Pascoe anxiously.

'Never better. It's just something I've always wanted to say,' said Wield. 'Sorry. Are we going after them?'

'Aye, are we,' said Dalziel, setting off across the lawn.

It occurred to Pascoe that if Bendish sought sanctuary in the church, like Thomas a Becket he was in for a big surprise. But Wield pointed to the open door leading into Green Alley and they plunged into that shadowy tunnel which the sudden surge of vernal sun seemed to have rendered even more luxuriant. Drooping boughs brushed their new fingers of leaf and blossom against Wield's face as he raced along. Pascoe was not far behind, but Dalziel, who, though surprisingly fast over a short distance, was no marathon man, had slowed considerably.

Now the path broadened into the little restful glade, and Wield stopped so suddenly that Pascoe ran into him.

Sitting on the bench under the mocking eye of the marble faun was a young man dressed in grey slacks and a white shirt above which flamed a mop of bright red hair. Against his left leg, like a symbol of office, rested a chestnut walking stick with a bone handle carved in the shape of an eagle's head.

'h.e.l.lo, lad,' said Wield. 'Still baht 'at, I see.'

Pascoe, who had been rather impressed by the young man's letter, smiled rea.s.suringly and said, 'h.e.l.lo. It's good to see you're OK.'

And now Dalziel arrived, moving at the measured pace of the High Priest approaching the sacrificial altar.