to provide answers. The local media will want to see faces they know, not listen to the meanderings of some imported spin doctor. Our own men need to feel they’re involved instead of being sidelined by a bunch of—’
‘Enough, Chief Inspector!’ said Trimble, rising.
He wasn’t a very big man, but even Dalziel grudgingly allowed that, when he wanted, Trimble could be quite formidable. Clearly he wanted now.
‘Decisions have been made. Your job when you return officially to work will be to follow and to implement them. I’m sure that Chief Superintendent Glenister will keep you informed of progress, on a need-to-know basis, of course…’
‘You mean there may be things relating to criminal activity in Mid-Yorkshire that I don’t need to know?’ exclaimed Pascoe incredulously. ‘Has there been a change of government or what?’
Trimble went fiery red. But before he could reply, Glenister said, ‘Hey, come on, you two! My da used to say that the English were a cold, unfeeling race, no passion. He should be here now! Dan, Peter’s quite right. I’d feel the same in his position. Home Office guidelines! What do those wankers know about life at the sharp end, eh? And I could do with all the help I can get. Why don’t you leave me and him to get acquainted and work out a modus operandi?’
The chief constable thought for a moment, during which his cheeks cooled to their normal healthy glow.
‘That sounds reasonable,’ he said. ‘But if you should decide that in your estimation the chief inspector needs to rest for the full term of his prescribed convalescence, just let me know.’
He left.
Pascoe said, ‘You and the Chief seem to be very close.’
‘Oh yes, we go way back, me and Dan,’ said the woman. ‘Started out together in the days of auld lang syne.’
And now, thought Pascoe, Dan’s chief constable and you’re chief super which, making allowances for what Andy called the handicap of tits and twat in the police promotion stakes, puts you several lengths ahead. Definitely one to watch.
She stood up and came round the desk to his side.
‘Anything new on Mr Dalziel?’ she asked.
He shook his head.
‘Well, while there’s life…Sorry if that sounds banal but, at times like this, there’s no gap between banal and pretentious. I found that out when I lost my man. Banal’s sincere; pretentious means they don’t give a damn.’
‘Your…man, was he job?’
‘Oh yes. Funny really. We’d been married seven years. I was at the point where I really had to decide, kids or career. Then I woke up one morning realizing I could have both. Just as me and Colin would share the kids, so we’d share his career, which looked set to be glorious. It all seemed so obvious. I’d never felt so happy. And that of course was the day it happened.’
She fell silent. Pascoe didn’t ask what happened. Her motives for telling him this much were obscure. If she wanted to tell him more, she would.
After a while he said, ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Thank you. So am I. On the other hand, if it hadn’t been for that, I wouldn’t be here now. Peter, why don’t you sit there?’
She indicated the chair behind the desk which she’d just vacated.
‘If anyone should keep this seat warm, it’s you,’ she said. ‘I’ve got an Ops room down the corridor. Dan asked me if I’d sit in here if I had any spare time. With his two best CID officers out of the frame, I think he wants someone senior to make sure things keep ticking over. I didn’t much care for the idea, but, like I say, he’s an old friend…’
She smiled the smile of someone who finds old friends hard to refuse.
In fact, guessed Pascoe, what she was probably doing was checking through Andy’s files to see if there was anything there which tied in even remotely with the events in Mill Street. She’d be lucky. Dalziel’s system of paperwork was sibylline.
Left to himself he would have been reluctant to take over the Fat Man’s seat, but now he refused to play coy.
He sat down, looked around and said, ‘Some-one’s been tidying up.’
‘Me, I’m afraid. The way I work. Set things in order, then you’ll see what they mean. Your Mr Dalziel, from all accounts, belongs to the opposite school. Ignore chaos and ultimately its meaning will come looking for you.’
‘I think rather he had…has…the ability to set things in order in his mind, but reckons that chaos has its meaning too,’ said Pascoe.
‘Meaning now I’ve put stuff where it ought to be, he won’t be able to find a thing,’ she laughed. ‘Anyway, here’s the deal, Peter. You’ll have full access to my Ops room. I’ll have full access anywhere I care to go in CID. I’ll consult with you first before using anything I think may be relevant. And I expect you to return the courtesy.’
Seated at Dalziel’s desk, it occurred to Pascoe that the proper response would be to say he didn’t take kindly to folk offering to do him favours on his own CID floor, but he swallowed the words and said as mildly as he could manage, ‘That sounds reasonable. Why don’t we stroll along to your Ops room now and you can bring me up to speed?’
He rose, went to the door, opened it, and stood there to usher her out.
For a moment she looked slightly non-plussed at the speed with which he was moving things along, then gave him the open matronly smile again and moved through the doorway.
The CAT Ops room bore the Glenister trademark. It was as tidy and well organized as she’d left Dalziel’s desk. Three computers had been set up on a trestle table at the far end. Not a spare inch of power cable showed. On a wall-board were pinned six photos, three showing the remains found in the ruins of Mill Street, each connected to a headshot of a man, two of them distinctly Asian in colouring and feature, the third less so. Beneath each photo was a name. Umar Surus, Ali Awan, and Hani Baraniq.
‘Surus and Awan are positive ID’s,’ said Glenister. ‘We have dental records and, in Awan’s case, DNA. Baraniq isn’t positive yet but we’re eighty per cent sure.’
‘You’ve shown these pics to Hector?’
‘Naturally. Could be his “sort of darkie” was Awan, and the other possibly Baraniq, though he’s even vaguer there. I’ve tried to push him beyond “sort of funny, not so much a darkie”, but no luck. I hope we never have to put poor Hec up on the witness stand.’
She spoke with a smile.
Pascoe thought, Two minutes on our patch and already she’s making our jokes.
He said, ‘Look, what Hector doesn’t see is most things. But what he says he does see, you can usually rely on. His shortcomings are verbal rather than optical.’
This wasn’t just a knee-jerk Hector-might-be-an-idiot-but-he’s-our-idiot reaction. Pascoe had once spotted Hector sitting on a park bench, notebook open on his knee, eyes fixed on a pair of sparrows dining
