Pascoe's mind was racing.
'That'd mean, or might mean, that Evans is not altogether wrong. And if he's not altogether wrong, then Connon suddenly gets a great big motive.'
'Motive? What motive?'
'Why, she, Mary Connon that is, finds out.' 'How?' 'Accidentally by finding something,' said Pascoe impatiently. 'Or is deliberately told. Anonymous friend, a telephone call, that kind of thing. We've got one around that doesn't like Connie much, we know that.'
'So. She knows. What then?'
'She tells him, that night. Gets nasty. Says some more unpleasant things about his daughter. Connon sees red. He's had that crack on the head remember. He grabs…' Pascoe paused.
'What does he grab, Sergeant?'
'How do I know? Something odd enough in shape not to be a normal part of living-room furniture. Something, anything, he can use as a club. And swings it at her.'
'At his own wife? Sitting in his own lounge? Connon?'
Pascoe sighed. 'I didn't know the lady as well as you, sir, but she seems in all particulars to have been a pretty clubbable woman.' 'No, I didn't mean her. I mean Connon. It's out of character. You've met him. Sudden violence doesn't fit.' The fat sod's fair, thought Pascoe. You've got to admit he's fair. I'm sure he'd like it to be Connon, but he doesn't try to bend matters. 'Perhaps the whole thing's a fake then, sir. Perhaps there was no concussion, no quarrel, no heat of the moment. Perhaps Connon decided he would like to marry Gwen Evans or just unmarry Mary Connon. So he goes quietly home, sits and watches the telly with her a while; then, in the commercial break perhaps, he leans forward, taps her on the head with whatever he has selected for the job, waits a couple of hours, then rings us.' Dalziel was scratching with both hands, one on his inner right thigh, the other under his chin. One movement was clockwise, Pascoe noted, the other anti. Difficult.
'That sounds better. But not by much.'
Well, let's have your ideas, for God's sake. You're the great detective! Pascoe kept back his exasperation with difficulty and put his thoughts as mildly as he could manage.
'What do you think then, sir? An intruder?'
Dalziel laughed without much merriment. 'You and your damned intruder. No, be sure of one thing, there wasn't any intruder, my lad. The answer's nearer home. Your intruders'll all turn out to be like that laddo last night. Bit of a disappointment that, eh? Christ, he could talk! Made even you sound like a board-school lad at the pit-face. But he seemed nice enough. He'll be good company for that kid of Connon's. He's not exactly the laughing cavalier, is he?'
Pascoe stood up.
He's going to try to get the knife in, he thought. Just a little wriggle this time. 'Will that be all then? I'd better try to tidy my desk up a bit.' 'Mind you,' continued Dalziel, ignoring him, 'it wasn't all waste, was it? I mean, Ted Morgan turned out to be a real find, didn't he? The eyes and ears of the world. You must have leaned upon him pretty hard.'
'Not really,' said Pascoe.
Dalziel leered at him across the desk. 'It's not a crime to take Jenny Connon out, you know. Eh? Now don't be offended. Just take care that fancying her doesn't make you go too soft on the rest of the family, or too hard on anyone else. I glanced at the stuff from young Curtis and the Fernies. Nothing much there, eh?'
Pascoe shook his head.
'Though the Fernies do seem to be around a lot, don't you think? And I met Mrs Curtis – she came in to see what it was all about. She'd just got in, and her husband. Do you know them?' 'No,' said Dalziel without interest. But Pascoe ploughed on. 'He's nothing, a little silent man, not much there, I think. She's a talker, gab, gab, gab. The Fernies got rid of her when I left and she walked me to the front gate. Made Ted Morgan seem like an amateur. But one thing she did say was that our friend Fernie is going around telling everyone Connon killed his wife. And claiming he knows how.' Dalziel was now immersed in some papers and didn't even glance up.
'There's always plenty of them, isn't there?'
'I wouldn't know, sir. Is it worth a word with him?' 'I shouldn't think so. There hasn't been a complaint? See him if you want, though, but it'll be a waste of time.' He glanced at his watch, opened the top drawer of his desk and swept the papers in. 'Come on,' he said. 'We'll be able to get a drink in a moment. You'll be wanting an early lunch, won't you?' 'Will I?' asked Pascoe, trying to conceal from himself the effort he had to make to keep up with Dalziel down the corridor. 'Why?'
'The rugby, Sergeant. Remember?'
'We're going to watch?' asked Pascoe, puzzled.
Dalziel sighed.
'I might watch. But the game you're concerned with is Arthur Evans. You heard what he said, his coach goes at twelve-forty-five. So you get round to his house at one. Have a chat. Stop a while. Who knows? Friend Connon might even turn up to keep you company. That'd be nice. You in your small corner, Gwen curled up on the mat and Connon taking his ease in Arthur's rocking chair.' The thought obviously amused him. They were out in the street now. Dalziel was well known, hailing and being hailed by nearly every second person they passed, it seemed to Pascoe. Though he noticed there were some who spoke to the superintendent and were completely ignored, while others looked as if they would have preferred to creep past unknown. Again there came to him a sense of how small a town of some eighty-five thousand people really was. 'Talking of chairs,' said Dalziel, 'there was a report from forensic, wasn't there, on that chair of Connon's? Nothing useful, I suppose?' Pascoe was never quite certain just how genuine his superior's casual contempt for science was. Had he really not even looked at the report? He felt tempted to find out by inventing a number of startling discoveries made through lab tests on the chair. But instead, as always, he thought, I'll play the game. 'No. Nothing. No indication that anyone had been killed in it or done anything else in it but sit in it. It went back to Connon's yesterday. He made them put it in the garden shed.' 'Did he now? Bit of degree work for you there, Pascoe! The psychology of the criminal.' They came to a halt at a busy road crossing. The town was full of Saturday morning shoppers, more than usual even; there was only one more Saturday before Christmas. 'Sir, what about Hurst and the letter? You mentioned last night…' 'Did I? No, I didn't, Sergeant. I'm not senile. Who did?'
Pascoe looked a little shamefaced.
'Well, Connon actually, on the phone. He asked if anything had been done.'
Dalziel slapped his inside pocket.
'It's here. I'll be seeing him before the match. Any other little reminders to me, Sergeant? Anything else I might have forgotten? No? Then what are we standing here for? Let's move on before some young copper picks us up for soliciting. Now, where did you say you were going to take me for that drink?' Jenny and Antony looked at each other, brown eyes unblinkingly fixed on blue, over the rims of their upraised pint pots. 'Umh,' said Antony appreciatively, putting his glass down and nodding his head, 'not bad at all. Unpretentious, with a pleasant touch of wit, should travel quite well. There is perhaps a slight tendency towards making one drunk.' They were sitting near a huge open fire in the lounge of a pub of that kind of indeterminate oldness which is the sign of constant use and development over many years. The fireplace was obviously very old indeed. It was large, and had once been larger. The table they sat at was wrought iron, with a bright brass guard-rail running round the top of it, more of a danger to glasses than anything else. In the ceiling there was visible what might have been an original oak cross-beam, but it had been unceremoniously distempered with the rest. T like it here,' said Antony. 'They have attempted neither to freeze the past, nor anticipate the future. Nor indeed to impress the present upon us with framed photographs of actors and actresses, cricketers and jockeys, the semi-famous sub-world, with duplicated scrawls of spurious well-wishings stamped across their corners.'