'Through someone else's garden?' said Pascoe.
'From my brief observation of Mr Connon's hedges, he seems to have a peculiar fondness for a near lethal mixture of African thorn, briar rose, and bramble.' 'May we, Mr Connon?' said Dalziel, setting off without waiting for an answer. They all stood in the rapidly darkening garden, most of them glad to have even the illusion of activity to take their minds off the unchanging situation. It was a long garden, the kind of length which only generous pre-war builders gave to house-buyers. There'd be a two-bedroomed bungalow tucked away there on a modern estate, thought Pascoe. Not that it bothers me. A bachelor gay. The hedges were as Antony had described them. The door to the garage passage was bolted and locked, as was the door in the trellis work on the other side.
'You always keep these locked?' asked Dalziel.
'Always at night,' said Connon. 'It's habit. One of us, Mary and me I mean, always checked. Sometimes both. It was a bit of a joke.' It was growing very cold in the garden. There was frost in the air. None of them was wearing an overcoat and Antony shivered violently.
'Over the tree?' suggested Pascoe.
A large sycamore tree growing in the front garden had branches which stretched along the side of the house over the trellis. 'I don't know,' said Dalziel. 'Possible, but I don't see why. He could hardly know he was going to get a show for his efforts, could he?' 'No,' said Pascoe, glancing at Connon and Antony. 'I don't suppose he could. Shall we go back in? It's a bit chilly out here.' Connon took a last look back at the gathering gloom before he stepped into the house. I know what he's thinking, Pascoe told himself. If they don't find her before it's dark…
He didn't much like the thought himself.
Dalziel still wasn't happy about the letter. He let the others go on, sat down on a kitchen stool and took it out of his pocket. Pascoe stepped back into the kitchen.
'There you are,' he said.
'You checked the house?' asked Dalziel, not raising his eyes from the sheet of paper he held gingerly before him.
'Yes. She's not tucked away here.'
'Then she'll probably be all right. Sergeant, read this letter again.' Silently Pascoe looked over his chief's shoulder and read. He felt again the anger which had gripped him when he first saw it.
'Any comment?'
'Well, sir, it's not really the same kind of vein as the last one, is it? I don't know if we can tell really much about such things, but I'd have said it wasn't from the same man.' "I think you're right. But something else too. You're our expert here. Making allowances for the natural exaggeration of this kind of mind and the rather stereotyped language, does that sound to you like Jenny Connon?'
Pascoe was puzzled.
'Well, I don't know,' he began, but Dalziel wasn't finished. 'And look at this paper. Look at the way it's folded. You know what I think
…' But he didn't finish. Outside in the hall they heard the front door open, footsteps pattered along the polished parquet floor and a light high voice cried, 'Daddy? Antony? Are you there?'
Pascoe's stomach did a quick flip-over, he beat Dalziel to the door by a full two yards and almost fell into the lounge. Jenny was being embraced by her father and Antony looked as if he was standing in the queue. 'Welcome home, Jenny,' said Dalziel. 'We were worried about you.' She turned and saw them. Her face lost some of its animation.
'Hello,' she said. 'You're here.'
'Jenny, what happened?' said her father. 'Why did you go out when you got the letter? You should have phoned us at the Club.' 'Got the letter?' she said. 'Oh, the letter. You found it?' Dalziel held it up gravely. Her face suddenly lit up with understanding.
'And you thought… oh, I see. Daddy, I'm so sorry.'
She put her arms around him again. Antony still stood patiently in the background. Connon looked puzzled.
'Sorry? What for, dear?' he asked.
Dalziel answered. 'Jenny is sorry she inadvertently misled us all, I think. You see, she didn't receive the letter. It wasn't meant for her. She found it. I think.' 'Among your mother's things!' said Antony with sudden understanding.
Connon's grip on his daughter relaxed.
'You mean, that letter was sent to Mary?' he said, incredulous. To Mary? No! She would have told me. You don't receive a letter like that and not…' His voice tailed off and he sat down heavily on the arm of a chair.
'Where did you find it, Jenny?' asked Pascoe gently.
There were tears in the girl's eyes now. 'In the wallet pocket of one of Mummy's old handbags. I thought I'd better turn everything out, you see, and then this came up. I just glanced at it, I didn't want to pry, but I had to look to see if it was important. I felt ill when I read it. It wasn't what it said, I mean I've read books and heard jokes just as bad, it was just the thought of Mummy getting it. I went into my own bedroom and sat on the bed for a few minutes. But then, I don't know, I got a bit frightened. The telephone rang, but I didn't answer it. I just got my coat and went out. I didn't want to talk to anyone, you know, but I wanted to be near people. So I got a bus into town. I thought I'd walk down to the Club and see you and Antony there, Daddy, but there were so many people, I could hardly move. I'd almost forgotten it was so near Christmas. Anyway I realized I'd have missed you at the Club, so I turned round and set off back. It took me ages. I'm sorry. I should have phoned. I didn't want you to find the letter before I'd told you about it.' She was crying hard now, tears coursing down her face over the pale curve of her cheeks. 'Sergeant,' said Dalziel, 'perhaps you'd take Miss Connon upstairs and ask her to show you where she found the letter.'
He waited till the door closed behind them.
'Now Mr Connon, I'll want to talk at length to you about this, you realize. But quickly now while Jenny's upstairs, do you have any knowledge, any suspicion even of the source of this letter?' 'None. Nor did I even suspect its existence,' said Connon. 'Superintendent, could this have anything to do with Mary's death?'
'I don't know. I really don't know.'
The door opened again and Pascoe came in alone. He motioned with his head to Antony, who nodded and went swiftly out of the room and up the stairs.
'Well, Sergeant?'
Pascoe held up a large envelope. 'I've put them in here. Three more in all, sir. In the same place. Jenny must have just got hold of the first. And, sir.'
'Yes.'
'Mrs Connon's bedroom is at the front.'
Chapter 6.
'It'll soon be Christmas,' said Pascoe inconsequently. Dalziel's gaze wandered suspiciously round the room as if seeking signs that someone had had the effrontery to deface the slightly peeling wall with festive decoration. 'What do you want, Sergeant? A present?' he asked sourly. It's getting him down, thought Pascoe with a frisson of pleasure for which he was instantly and heartily ashamed.
It was, after all, his job too.
But the past few days had been depressing. Things had seemed to be opening up. For a while there had been a feeling that they were asking the right questions and that at any moment the individual answers would shuffle themselves into a significant total. But they remained ragged, unfinished, unproductive. The enquiry's initial impetus was being lost and now they were all groping. Other matters, important and routine, had arisen. New demands on time and men were being made all the time.
'Yes, I suppose it will,' said Dalziel.
'Will what?'
'Soon be Christmas.'
Thanks,' acknowledged Pascoe satirically, but for once Dalziel ignored him. 'Something'11 happen soon. Something pretty big. We're stretched as it is. Something will happen that will almost snap us. It always does,' he ended with sour satisfaction. 'Just before Christmas.'