A clubbable woman

'I can't promise. I'll try to make it.'

'Oh, and Bruiser. As you're short of a partner, why not bring that nice sergeant along? Whatsisname?' 'Watch it, Jacko,' said Dalziel softly. 'There's a notice on my overcoat which says, this is where Christmas stops.' 'All right. But I meant it. Ask him anyway. It pleases these old cows to have a virile young man about the place.' Dalziel grunted and thought that Jacko must be doing well at the moment to be in, for him, so light-hearted a mood. He made a mental note to check on what the builder had been up to. 'Right,' he said. 'You said there was some business. Or is that what we've just been talking about?' 'That's an odd thing to say, super. No, but are you still interested in this Connon business or is it all neatly tied up?' 'Don't play clever buggers with me, Jacko. What have you got? Anything or nothing?' 'I don't know. It's just that Mary Connon and Arthur Evans were seen in close confabulation over a drink the Friday before she died.'

Dalziel digested the information for a moment.

'Where?' he asked.

'The Bull, on the coast road.'

'Anything else on a connection between them?'

'Not that I've heard.'

'It's probably nothing. That all?'

'Unless you're going to thank me.'

Dalziel put the phone down hard and sat looking at it. Then he picked up the internal phone and pressed a button.

'Sergeant Pascoe here.'

'Dalziel. Busy?'

'Well yes. I've just got in.'

'Had your tea?'

'Not yet. I was just going to…'

Then you can't be all that busy. Step along here for a minute, will you. Bring your coat. I'll probably want you to go out.' Pascoe sighed as he took his sodden riding mac off the radiator. A minute earlier he had been feeling sorry for the men who were still out on house-to-house questioning. Now he began to wonder if his sympathy was misplaced. Back in Dalziel's office the phone rang again. He picked it up crossly, but after listening for a few moments, his expression softened and he nodded twice.

'Yes, yes. That's good. I'm glad, very very glad.'

Pascoe was surprised to find him looking almost happy when he came through the door. 'Jesus H. Christ,' muttered Detective-Constable Edwards. It was his private theory that Wood field Council estate had been built as a series of experiments in wind-tunnelling. Behind him the door of the house whose occupant he had just been interviewing had been closed with considerable firmness. Some attempt had been made to turn the area immediately in front of the door into a rose-arbour by the erection of a bit of trellis work at right angles to the wall, and he crouched behind the little protection this afforded. The wind came howling down the street full of rain and incipient snow. A shoot of the rambler clinging precariously to the trellis whipped round and slashed against his face. 'Jesus,' he repeated and turned up his collar and went up the path. As he closed the gate he saw the curtain drop into position in the front window. 'All right. I'm off the premises,' he said aloud. What a thing it was to be loved. Not that we deserve it anyway. Bloody half-wits. God, to think how chuffed I was to get out of uniform. Detective! All I've done since seems to be walk around and knock on doors. First Connon. Now this. Poor little bugger. I wonder where he is? He turned his mind away from the private conviction that little Mickey Annan was somewhere lying dead; deep beneath bracken on the moors; under an old sack in some outhouse; it didn't matter where. His job at the moment was to ask questions.

Someone must have seen the boy that night.

His heart sank when he saw where his questionings would take him next. It was a little cul-de-sac of some two dozen semi-detached bungalows. Pensioners. Old Women. Mostly alone, often lonely. Welcoming, garrulous. He would be pressed to cups of tea, cocoa, Bovril, Horlicks. He tried to harden his heart in advance, but knew it was just a front. I'm your friendly village-bobby-type, he thought, not your hard-as-nails CID boy. This is going to take hours. 'Mrs Williams? Mrs Ivy Williams?' he said to the large heavily-made-up woman who answered his ring.

'No, that's my mam. What are you after, then?'

'I'm from the police. We're checking on the movements of people in this area last night, Mrs…?' 'My name's Girton. Is it about that lad then what's missing? Well, mam can't help you. Never gets out at night, do you, mam?' An elderly woman had appeared out of the kitchen which Edwards could see through the half-opened door at the end of the small hallway.

'What's that? What's up?'

'It's a policeman, mam. You weren't out last night, were you, mam?'

'No, I wasn't. Where'd I go?'

'That's right,' said Mrs Girton to Edwards. 'Where'd she go?' 'Well, thank you. You weren't here yourself last night, were you?' 'No, not me. Mondays and Thursdays are my regular nights. Sorry.' 'Will you have a cup of tea, eh?' Mrs Williams was; already turning into the kitchen. Her daughter caught the: look on Edwards's face and grinned sympathetically. 'Don't be daft, mam. He's got a lot of work to do,, haven't you? Got to visit everyone in the road?'

'That's right. Thanks all the same. Good night.'

He turned to go. 'Everyone in the road, eh?' shrilled the old woman. 'Well, make sure you talk to Mrs Grogan next door, then. She knows something, eh? She'll be able to tell you something if you're from the police.'

She disappeared back into the kitchen.

Edwards raised his eyebrows quizzically at Mrs Girton, who shrugged. 'You never know. She's getting on now, but she takes good notice of whatever anyone says. I wouldn't pay too much heed myself, though.'

'Well, thanks anyway. Good night.'

'Good night.' It was raining in earnest. He glanced at his sodden list under the street-lamp. Mrs Kathleen Grogan, No 2. There was a sharp double blast from a horn. Turning, he saw at the end of the cul-de-sac a police-car. He went towards it. 'Hello, Brian,' said the uniformed constable cheerily. 'Enjoying yourself?'

'Great. What are you doing here?'

They've found him. Mickey Annan.' Edwards nodded and said, more as assertion than question, 'Dead?' 'No. Alive and well. We've come to tell you to jack it in. Hop in and we'll give you a lift back.' Edwards was half into the back seat before he remembered Mrs Grogan. He hesitated. 'Come on, then.' 'Look, John. Could you hang on just a couple of minutes? There's just one more call I'd like to make.' 'What're you on about? Playing detectives? I told you, the house-to-house is off..

'Yes but…'

'Sorry, Brian. I've got to get on. There's at least two other poor sods trudging around in the wet when they could be clocking off and going home. Now hop in and let's go.'

Edwards got back out of the car.

'OK, John. You shove off. I'll make my own way back.' 'Have it your own way. But you're a silly bugger. Cheers.' Yes, I'm a silly bugger. The silly bugger to end all silly buggers. 'Bugger!' he said aloud as he watched the car's taillights disappear into the driving rain. 'I must be mad.' He made his way back along the pavement and turned up the narrow path. Pascoe had sat in silence as his superior swiftly and efficiently did his part in calling off the search for Mickey Annan. This was the first rule when an operation was over. Get your men back. There were too many working hours for too few police as it was without letting any be wasted unnecessarily.

Finally Dalziel was done.

'What happened?' Pascoe had asked.

'He was out looking for Jesus.'

'What?' 'It's these bloody schools. When I was a kid it was twotimes table and the sharp edge of a ruler along your arse if you didn't know them. Now it's all stimulating the imagination. Christ! Show me a kid who ever needed his imagination stimulated! Anyway, little Mickey Annan was a wise man in the school Nativity play and got very interested in guiding stars in the East, and all. Especially when his teacher explained that Jesus was born again for everyone every Christmas and Bethlehem was never far away. How many bloody miles to Bethlehem! His favourite poem! Anyway, to Mickey the East was where his Uncle Dick and Aunt Mavis live at High Burnton out towards the coast.'