Deadheads

2

Shaheed Singh felt his left wrist seized and his forearm forced upwards behind his body which was rammed sideways against the wall, pinning his right arm uselessly against the rough brick.

'I've been looking for you,' growled a hoarse voice in his ear.

Twisting his head round, Singh found himself looking into the deep-set and vein-crazed eyes of Superintendent Dalziel whose normal ferocity of expression was not improved by a bruised and swollen nose.

'Come on, lad,' said the Superintendent, releasing him. 'You've got some answering to do.'

Feeling more like a prisoner than a colleague, Singh trailed along behind Dalziel's huge hulk, out of the car park where he'd been intercepted and into the station and up the stairs to the Super's room.

Dalziel settled comfortably into the extra-large executive-type office chair, all black leather and chrome, which baffled the annual inventory-takers, and said, 'Sit yourself down, son, make yourself at home,' with a geniality Singh found even more frightening than the initial assault.

'You might as well enjoy the facilities,' continued Dalziel, 'as I gather you've been kind enough to lend CID a hand while I've been away. Sort of filling the gap, so to speak.

‘Some gap, thought Singh, and the comic response, though naturally internalized beyond identification without truth drugs, relaxed him a little.

'Mr Pascoe has left me a full report of everything,' said Dalziel. 'Everything. He's out just now, acting on information you've supplied him with. That must make you proud, lad. To have a Detective-Inspector, not to mention a Detective-Sergeant, occupying a Saturday morning at your behest. And now you've got me. So tell me all about it.'

Singh told. Dalziel questioned. After twenty minutes they both fell silent. Singh sat anxiously, waiting for blame, praise or just simple dismissal. Dalziel stared gloomily at his desk surface, shoulders hunched as though under a burden, and right index finger gently patrolling the fold of flesh which hung over his shirt collar.

'Want to be a copper, do you?' Dalziel said suddenly.

'Yes, sir,' said Singh in a positive tone.

'Why?'

Singh thought of the tangle of reasons which had led, if such a tangle could be said to lead, him to his decision. He settled for simplicity.

'Because I think it's an interesting job, sir. And I think I'll like it. And I think I'll be good at it, sir.'

'Strikes me you think too bloody much, lad,' growled Dalziel. 'Mebbe you should try knowing and doing instead of all this thinking.'

'I'm sorry, sir,' said Singh. 'I just thought. .' He tailed off miserably.

'There's only two places in a bobby's life, son,' said Dalziel, 'and you've got to be able to live in 'em both. One's out there.'

The index finger emerged from the carnal crease at his collar and poked a hole (metaphorically, though to Singh's eyes the violent digit looked as if it could have managed it figuratively) in the station wall to reveal the outside world.

'Out there it's dark and dangerous and dirty,' said Dalziel. 'Out there, there's men with clubs and knives and sawn-off shotguns who don't much care who gets in their way when they're at their work. Worse; out there, there's men with paving stones and petrol bombs whose work is to provoke us to get in their way. Oh, it's an interesting job all right.

'And then there's the other place and that's in here.'

The finger stabbed down. Singh grasped that what was being indicated was not the interior of Dalziel's desk, but the police station, indeed perhaps the whole of the police force.

'Out there is bad. But sometimes,' said Dalziel, 'sometimes in here makes you long to be back out there, like you long for a pint of ale when you've had a hot, hard day and you're drier than a Wee Free Sunday. Do you follow me, lad?'

Curiously, Singh did. There was no way that he could know that Dalziel was still smouldering at the memory of his last encounter at Scotland Yard. Summoned to the office of the Deputy Commissioner co-ordinating the conference, he had been told in no uncertain terms that his behaviour had caused so much complaint that an adverse report was being sent to his Chief Constable. Insubordinate, disruptive, inattentive and absent were the principal epithets used, not all of them compatible with each other, Dalziel had pointed out, which had provoked the final outburst. Last words are a privilege of rank, and Dalziel was still smarting.

None of this was he about to tell Singh, of course, but the cadet was already beginning to realize that in here was peopled with monsters, or monstered with people, who could cause as much terror and pain as any robber or rioter. So he nodded his head in genuine not just sycophantic agreement.

'Good. You've nearly finished your attachment here, haven't you?'

'Yes, sir. Just another four days.'

'You've done well,' said Dalziel unexpectedly. 'Not much chance usually for a cadet to do well as far as CID's concerned. But you've shown a bit of initiative. I'll see it gets mentioned on your report.'

'Thank you, sir,' said Singh, his stomach turning with pleasure. 'Thank you very much.'

'Right. Push off now. Tell one of them idle buggers down below I'd appreciate a mug of tea. I'm only away a few days and they're sliding into idle habits!'

'Yes, sir,' said Singh standing to attention. 'Sir. .'

'Don't hang about, lad,' said Dalziel.

But Singh, emboldened by praise, said, 'Sir, if there's going to be a stake-out, at Rosemont, I mean, sir, because of my information, like, I wonder if mebbe I could. .'

Dalziel's basilisk gaze froze the trickle of words.

'Fancy a bit of action, do you, lad? Bloody a couple of noses, get a police medal?'

'No, sir. I just thought mebbe the experience. .'

'Let me tell you about the experience,' said Dalziel. 'Either you'll sit on your arse, bloody uncomfortable, all night, and you'll end up in the morning, cold and tired, with bugger-all to show for it, and the officers you're with will all know it's been on your say-so they've wasted their time. Or the villains'll come and there'll be a bit of aggro and mebbe a bit of blood. Any road, when the lights go on, there'll be you, standing there feeling all pleased; and looking right at you will be your old mate, what's his name? oh yes, Jonty Marsh. Are you ready for that, lad? Whichever way it goes?'

Singh hesitated, recalling Wield had warned him along similar lines.

There was a tap on the door behind him.

'Come in!' bellowed Dalziel.

The door opened and Pascoe appeared with Wield behind him.

'Here they are, the heavenly twins, Castor and Bollocks,' said Dalziel. 'Run along, son, and don't forget about that tea.'

Singh left, passing under the craggy indifference of Wield's expression like a nervous pinnace beneath a fortified cliff.

'Welcome back, sir,' said Pascoe, observing the swollen nose with keen interest. 'We weren't expecting you till this afternoon.'

'I skipped the fond farewells,' said Dalziel. 'I've been going through all this stuff on Aldermann, then I had a word with young Abdul.'

'Singh, you mean, sir? Shaheed is his first name, I think,' said Pascoe.

'Aye, Abdul. He's not daft, that lad. Has someone been giving him a hard time? I just got an impression he might be feeling he's being shoved around a bit.'

He glared accusingly at the two men.

'I won't have officers throwing their weight around,? he said. 'Consideration for subordinates, that's what it takes to knit a good team together. Understood?'

Pascoe glanced at Wield, then said, 'I entirely agree, sir.'

'Good. Now what have you two idle sods been at these past few days? This joker Aldermann, are we arresting him or protecting him?'

'Protecting him,' said Pascoe promptly. 'I've found nothing concrete to suggest he's ever stepped over the line except in the case of the old lady's money when he was working for Capstick in Harrogate.'

'One step's often enough,' said Dalziel.

'We're all permitted one bit of stupidity, sir,' said Pascoe. 'Anyway, there's something else.'

Briefly he recounted what Daphne had told him at Rosemont.

Dalziel sniffed, rubbed his nose and winced.

'That's something,' he said grudgingly. 'That explains a few things.'

'A lot,' said Pascoe firmly.

'You're recommending we wrap it up, are you?'

'We have no complainant, no evidence of crime, nothing!' said Pascoe.

The internal telephone rang. Wield picked it up and listened.

'Sir,' he said to Dalziel, 'there's a Mr Masson to see you.'

'Masson! The solicitor? What's he want?' asked Pascoe.

Dalziel made a face. It wasn't pretty.

'Acting on information received,' he intoned, 'mainly from you, Inspector, indicating you believed Masson wasn't coming clean with us, I rang the old sod at his golf club and told him he'd better get his arse down here if he didn't want to be retrospectively struck off. Or words to that effect.'

'Oh dear,' said Pascoe.

'Now you tell me that the case is closed,' said Dalziel. 'Perhaps you'd like to talk to him?'

'No, thanks,' said Pascoe.

'Tell 'em to wheel him in,' Dalziel said to Wield. Christ, is there nothing we can charge anyone with? Have you been right through the index in the big book?'

'We might try Elgood and Mandy Burke with perjury?' suggested Pascoe. 'Or perhaps she actually gave the ladder a push. .'

'Do you really believe that? No? Nor do I. Accident. Perjury now, they'd have to cough in front of witnesses, and they're not going to do that, are they? No, the lines I was thinking on were that Aldermann spotted Burke and Elgood making off after lunch at the White Rose and gave the husband a ring in the hope he'd catch them in the stirrups. Good as a killing, that. He'd not be likely to stay on at Perfecta, would he? Still, now you've washed him whiter than snow, that's buggered that, hasn't it?'

There was a tap at the door. Wield opened it and Masson stepped in. He was wearing a red sports shirt and checked trousers.

'Right, Inspector Pascoe, that'll do for now, but I'll want to talk to you later,' said Dalziel sternly. 'Mr Masson, good of you to come!'

Pascoe and Wield left. As Pascoe closed the door he heard the beginning of Dalziel's conversation.

'Promising lad, that Pascoe, but a bit overkeen sometimes. I'm sorry if he's been bothering you about the Mrs Highsmith business.'

'What business is that?' said Masson sharply.

'You're not still her solicitor, are you?' said Dalziel. 'You'll understand then, I really can't say. Of course, if she herself wanted to see you. .'

He nodded significantly at the wall, as if suggesting Penelope were chained to the other side of it. It was simply his intention to get rid of Masson with minimum aggro, but it was already striking him as curious that the man hadn't come in with all guns blazing indignation. He decided to try the all-boys-together line. Besides, he felt in need of sustenance.

'What about a drink?' he said. 'And a little chat off the record.'

He took a huge key from his pocket, opened the cupboard in his desk and produced a bottle of Glen Grant and two glasses which he filled to the brim.

'Here's health,' he said.

They drank.

'Of course,' he went on, but not sure where he was going, 'you were Mrs Highsmith's solicitor after she inherited the house, weren't you? There was all that business about the disappeared will. .'

For a moment he thought he was going to get the expected explosion from Masson but then the old man relaxed and drank deeply from his glass.

'Look,' he said. 'I'm not absolutely sure what this is all about, but there are some things it might help you to know, only. .'

'Only. .?'

'Between these four walls?'

'Of course. You have my word,' said Dalziel solemnly.

'All right then,' said Masson, taking a deep breath.

What came was an anti-climax.

'I've no idea what happened to the will,' said Mr Masson.

'None?' said Dalziel disbelievingly.

'Nothing that I could offer in evidence,' said the solicitor firmly.

'But suspicions?'

'Ah, suspicions! Suspicions are only malicious guesses, aren't they? There had been a will. I had left it with Mrs Aldermann after she had called me in to discuss the possibility of changing it substantially in favour of her niece. She died. There was no will to be found. Why should I be suspicious rather than accept that in all likelihood the old lady had torn it up prior to getting me to draft a new one?'

‘Because,' said Dalziel gently, 'because you buggers are like us buggers, you're bred up to be suspicious. Instead of which you're sitting there all sweetness and light and Christian understanding! You weren't having a bit on the side with Mrs Highsmith, by any chance, were you?'

'Mr Dalziel! How dare you?' cried Masson, scandalized.

'It's not impossible,' protested Dalziel. 'She's a very attractive woman. You were a vigorous young man, well, in the prime of life, twenty years ago.'

'I was, I was,' said Masson, suddenly smiling. 'I could tell you a tale. . but I won't. And I certainly wouldn't have dreamt of bending my sense of duty in the interests of a mere personal relationship!'

'But you did suspect that it wasn't Mrs Aldermann who'd got rid of the will, didn't you?' pressed Dalziel. 'So why did you sit on your arse and say nowt? Why?'

'All right, I'll tell you why,' said Masson with sudden passion. 'Because justice was best served by doing nothing. Because I was absolutely certain that three years earlier, Florence Aldermann had deliberately and maliciously destroyed her husband's will, that's why!'

Dalziel finished his whisky in his surprise and had to pour himself another.

'But why should she?' he wondered. 'This chap, Eddie Aldermann, wasn't the kind to disinherit his wife from what I've heard of him.'

'Of course he wasn't. He was the fairest, the kindest, of men. I drew up his will, of course. In it he left the bulk of his estate to his wife. But he also left a substantial legacy to Mrs Highsmith to be held in trust for her son, Patrick, till he came of age. It was this that so offended Mrs Aldermann, I suspect. Oh yes, there was no doubt in my mind but that she destroyed the will. Unfortunately I had just suffered a bereavement myself, my wife. And I had gone to Australia on a six-month visit to my daughter there. I didn't know anything of all this till I came back. No will! I was furious. But I was uncertain what to do. There were constraints upon me, you see. After all, I might have been wrong. It wasn't until she herself was struck down two years later and Mrs Highsmith came to Rosemont to take care of her that I learned that the allowance Eddie had always made her had been discontinued. Then I was sure! But it began to look as if things might be regularized without my intervention. There was all this talk of Mrs Highsmith staying on permanently, and of a new will. I was determined that justice would be done in this one, and to Mrs Aldermann's credit it must be said that she'd come to a much truer estimate of her niece's worth. It takes a brush with death to put things in perspective sometimes, Mr Dalziel.'

Dalziel rubbed his huge hand across his huge face.

'Look,' he said in his kindliest tones, 'I still can't see why you let it pass. I mean, I can see why someone else might do it, but I know you, Mr Masson, I know how you've always gone on about the letter of the law being as important as the spirit, and I can't see how, on what you've told me, you could convince yourself you were right to say nothing if you thought Penny Highsmith had removed that will. Why not take it to the law and try to sort out things there?'

Masson laughed. It was an unexpected sound, high and clear and girlish.

'It was because I could have done that and won very easily that I did what I did, Mr Dalziel,' he cried. 'That was the whole point! But I'd promised Eddie, you see. And also there'd have been a very great scandal. Things in those days weren't quite so free as now. This way achieved the same, the right, the proper result, without any of that.'

'You've lost me,' said Dalziel. 'What result? What did you promise Eddie Aldermann?'

Masson shook his head. 'A promise is a promise.'

'To a dead man. Listen, you've bent your principles a good way, just bend them a little more. If you don't, I'll just have to go on probing. People will start talking, I don't know what about yet, but they will. And I'll probe till I find out. You've given me a direction, Masson. I'll keep going till I get there.'

No one could view the menacing thrust of Dalziel's huge head and the determined clamp of the jaws without believing him.

'All right. But no further!'

'Than necessary,' said Dalziel, uncompromising now he knew he'd won.

'Patrick's father,' said Masson.

'Yes?'

'Patrick Highsmith's father.'

'Yes! said Dalziel, there already, but determined to make Masson say it.

'Patrick Highsmith's father was Eddie Aldermann.'