Dalziel And Pascoe: Under World Part 19

'Adi, there is nothing going on!'

'I'll see you in court,' said the other disbelievingly, opening the car door and struggling out over the coils of unreconstructed seat-belt. 'Ellie, why don't you get a decent car? Two minutes in this heap and your husband would be on his way to the car showroom - by taxi!'

'Are you going back to town?' asked Ellie.

'You've guessed. There's nothing for me here. If young Lord Byron up there does decide he needs a lawyer, he'll be all right with that shark the Union sent along. Are you heading back too? I'll drive along behind you if you like, to pick up the pieces.'

'No, thanks, I've got a couple of things I want to do here.'

'By yourself? Well, as long as you don't frighten the horses. See you.'

Ellie watched Adrienne get into her shiny red sports car and roar away.

'At least mine's British,' she muttered turning the ignition key to produce a pneumonic wheeze. Before she could try again, a fist like a fender rapped against the pa.s.senger window which was almost immediately filled by a face like a flitch.

'I thought it were you,' said Dalziel with delighted surprise, opening the door and climbing in. 'Just visiting, I hope? A rich relative, is it?'

'Don't muck around, Andy,' said Ellie irritably. 'You know it was me that got Adi Pritchard to visit Colin Farr. So Peter was right when he said you lot might get landed with this case.'

'Yes. I've got him working on it himself. But don't worry. He's a long way away from here.'

He tapped his nose in a gesture both salacious and conspiratorial. Ellie was not certain which element most offended her, but what she was sure of was that in-fighting with Dalziel was like trying to tickle a grizzly to death. The only valid approach was with a flame-thrower from fifty yards.

She said, 'I hope you get the man who killed Mr Satterthwaite very soon. Now, if you'll excuse me.'

He didn't move but said, 'Reckon we've got him already. Your friend, Farr. Bird in the hand, like they say.'

'What evidence do you have?' she asked angrily.

He smiled and said softly, 'I didn't say we'd got any evidence yet. Just that we've got him. Evidence'll turn up. Weapon. Bloodstained clothes. Something he did or said on his way out of the mine. Or later when he got himself kaylied and came off his bike. Said nothing significant to you, did he?'

'You've read my statement,' evaded Ellie.

'Aye, I've read it,' said Dalziel. 'Funny, that, I thought. Here they were, sitting in a car - it'd be this car, would it? very cosy - and neither of 'em said owt to the other. Some people might take that the wrong way, of course.'

'You dirty-minded old sod,' said Ellie, her resolve not to be provoked bending as easily as it usually did.

He looked at her in amazed indignation, and said, 'Nay, Ellie. You've got me wrong. I never meant owt like that. All I was trying to say was, if you don't fill in the detail of what you and him did say, some folk might think you were trying to cover up for him. Now I know how easy it is to think things aren't worth putting down in a statement, all the ordinary trivial chat. "Nice weather we're having, have you seen the price of eggs in the market? That's a lovely dress you're wearing, my sister in London had one just like that four or five years ago." The sort of thing you and your mates pa.s.s the time of day with over your morning coffee.'

I'll kill him! thought Ellie wildly.

Steadying her voice she said, 'No, we didn't talk about the price of eggs or the dress he was wearing.'

'No? Then what did you talk about?' asked Dalziel. 'No, don't answer me now. Have a good think about it and then you can broaden out your statement when you call in at the local station later on.'

'At the station?'

'Aye. That was why you drove all the way down here, wasn't it? To modify your statement and mebbe check up on the result of your blood test.'

Her expression showed him that she had forgotten all about the test and also that Pascoe hadn't been in touch with her since he called at the lab that morning. Probably because she had already left to winkle out Pritchard. Possibly because he felt in the mood to let her sweat a little longer. Well, it was none of his business to interfere between man and wife. Yet.

He said, 'Aye. Could be serious that, Ellie. Lose your licence, big fine. They're really cracking down. So I'll see you later likely. Cheers now.'

He opened the door and unwedged himself from the low seat. As he got out, Ellie saw with antic.i.p.atory delight that the coil of seat-belt had wrapped itself round his ankles.

Dalziel stood upright, stretched, raised a huge arm in farewell, and walked away. Around his legs the belt tightened, tautened, and snapped, as without a stumble or a hesitation he strode towards the hospital.

Disappointedly, Ellie turned the key again. The engine came to life with the reluctance of one who has gone happily to his long rest after a race well run. Adi was right, it was time she had a decent car, it was time she a.s.serted herself in a hundred ways.

It was also time, she told herself with a return to humour as she nosed out of the car park, that the Women's Movement recognized that five minutes with Andy Dalziel was worth a month's budget of professional propaganda.

Fifteen minutes later without any conscious debate or decision she found herself parking round the corner from the terraced house in which May Farr lived with her son.

She felt herself observed as she approached the front door and not just by the police car parked further along Clay Street. Burrthorpe must be abuzz with what was going on. They might close ranks against outsiders but within the tribe there would be no shortage of slanderous speculation, prurient a.n.a.lysis and malicious gossip.

The door opened before she could knock.

'Come in,' said May Farr, 'before the whole street clocks you.'

She led the way into the little front room. Ellie had a sense of someone else in the house, probably in the kitchen.

'Right,' said the woman after checking that the net curtains were draped for maximum obfuscation. 'What do you want?'

She stood facing Ellie, her arms folded under her breast in the cla.s.sic working-cla.s.s pose of female aggression.

Ellie said, 'I was up at the hospital and I thought I'd come and see you.'

'Did you see Colin?'

'No, but I gather he's all right, physically I mean.'

'You didn't see him? I'd've thought they'd've let you in.'

'Because my husband's a policeman?'

'You said it.'

'Mrs Farr, you'd be surprised how few privileges being married to a copper brings you. Don't get me wrong. I'm not complaining. Nor am I apologizing for Peter. It's his job. It's what he is. And if he did something else, it'd be a loss to the police and the public alike. A loss to people like you and Colin, Mrs Farr.'

'And what are people like me and Colin like?' asked the woman with undiminished aggression.

'In trouble,' said Ellie gently.

May Farr digested this.

'Sit down,' she said finally. 'Well have a cup of tea. There's some ma.s.sed.'

Ellie would have preferred coffee or better still a stiff scotch, but she knew that the offer of tea was like salt in a Bedouin's tent. Also it gave May an excuse to go into the kitchen and update whoever it was she had in there.

The tea appeared in the same delicate china cups that had been used on her previous visit. Conversation waited till the ceremony of milk, sugar and tasting was complete.

'Right, Mrs Pascoe,' said May Farr. 'I admire the way you've stuck up for your man, but if you're not ashamed of him, why'd you lie about him when I asked you last time?'

'Because it didn't seem to matter then. I mean the truth would have mattered perhaps. It might have set you and Colin against me.'

'You think we all hate the police, do you?'

'A lot of you have had some cause, I think.'

'Is that what your man thinks too? No, forget I asked that. It's your business, married business. What I do want to know is why you're so keen to stick your neb into our business, Colin's and mine?'

'I didn't so much stick it in as have it rubbed in,' retorted Ellie, with whom a little humble pie went a long way. 'He rang me last night, asked me to help him. I didn't volunteer.'

'You didn't refuse either. You're not after Colin, are you, missus? He's not your what-do-they-call-it? bit of rough, is he?'

'I wouldn't call your son a bit of rough, Mrs Farr,' said Ellie steadily. 'I like him but I'm not after him. As for him, he could be after me but I'm not sure he likes me.'

'It was you he rang.'

'I don't know how surprising that was because I don't know who else he might have rung,' said Ellie. She was aware of the ambivalence and evasion at the heart of nearly all her answers, but her main concern was to keep things simple and straightforward as far as her own part in this drama went. Back home she might be Cressida, but here in the Greek camp she was just a walk-on part.

May Farr frowned, then nodded and said, 'You're right. Not many.'

She relaxed noticeably, perhaps because the odds on Ellie being a predatory middle-cla.s.s nymphomaniac had lengthened.

'What's going to happen to him, Mrs Pascoe?' she asked suddenly. 'What have they got on him, can you tell me that? I rang the police station and they told me nowt, then I rang the hospital and they didn't tell me much more. So what's happening, Mrs Pascoe?'

Ellie was saved from reiterating her ignorance by a knock at the front door.

'Now who's that?' said Mrs Farr irritably without making any move to find out. But someone was moving. Ellie heard the door being opened, the sound of voices, then the sitting-room door was pushed ajar and a head appeared wearing what she had thought of last night as the expression of an anxious horse. She reached for the name. Downey.

'Sorry to interrupt, May, but it's Stella, Stella Mycroft, Stella Gibson as was.'

'I know who Stella Gibson married, Arthur,' said May Farr in a rather exasperated tone. 'What's she want?'

'I just wanted to find out how Colin was,' said Stella, pushing past Downey into the room and looking at Ellie with undisguised curiosity.

What she saw, Ellie did not care to speculate. Seeing ourselves as others see us might be a desideratum of general social philosophy but it didn't apply when the other in question was in her early twenties, with an exquisite sensuous figure, silver-blonde hair and a face whose small features had a delicate beauty which not even a heavy hand with the make-up could disguise.

'Does Gavin know you're here?' asked Mrs Farr sharply.

The girl shrugged. Even that was a sensuous movement.

'I don't have to get permission to ask after an old friend,' she said. 'Any road, he'll be as keen to know what's going off as everyone else.'

'Oh, I don't doubt they're all taking a lively interest,' said the older woman bitterly. 'Well, they'll have to be disappointed, I know as little as they do and a d.a.m.n sight less than they can make up!'

'Is he still in hospital?'

'Yes, but they say he's OK, thank G.o.d. Stella, they say your Gavin saw Colin on his way out of the pit. What's he say happened?'

'Nothing much,' said Stella. 'What's Arthur think? He was down there too?'

'Oh, Arthur,' said May as if Downey weren't there. 'He'd not say owt he thought might upset me. But I always got straight talk from you when you were going with our Colin. At least I thought I did.'

So that was it, thought Ellie. An old flame. Perhaps not wholly extinguished either. She examined her feelings, recognized jealousy, and realized with perhaps more concern how little surprised or dismayed she was by the recognition.

'Folk are saying that Col hated Harold's guts,' said Stella, watching Ellie though she addressed her words to May. 'They're saying that he's always had a wild streak and that it'd not surprise them if it turned out he'd put paid to the b.a.s.t.a.r.d like he threatened often enough. That's what they're saying.'

'I asked for it straight,' said May Farr with a humourless smile. 'Do these folk say why Colin should have hated Harold Satterthwaite?'

Stella Mycroft hesitated, then said, Them things some folk hinted about Colin's dad and the Pedley kid, Harold Satterthwaite were the worst of all, he really believed them.'

'Nay, Stella, no need to bring all that up,' protested Downey indignantly. 'Not now. Aren't things bad enough?'

'It's all right, Arthur,' said May Farr. 'No other reason you can think of, Stella?'

'What other reason would Col need?' said the younger woman. 'You should know best how he felt about his dad?'

It was like watching a No play, thought Ellie. You could sense the drama without really understanding it. Certainly there was little love lost between these women. Did the elder resent the younger for having thrown her son over? Or the younger blame the elder for making him unmarriageable?

'Aye, I should,' said May Farr. 'I'll get you a cup of tea.'

'No, I mustn't stay,' began Stella, but the other woman was already out of the room. Arthur Downey looked reproachfully at Stella and said, 'Can't you watch what you're saying?' before he too left.

'Silly sod,' said Stella. 'Hangs around here like a toothless guard dog!'

'Are they . . . ?' said Ellie.

'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.