“Hang on.” Banks finally managed to get a word in and jerk his arm free of the man’s grasp. He showed his card. The man relaxed.
“Oh. Sorry, sir,” he said. “Detective Sergeant Waltham. I wasn’t to know.” Then he frowned. “What’s North Yorkshire want with this one, if you don’t mind my asking?”
He was in his early thirties, perhaps a few pounds overweight, about three inches taller than Banks, with curly ginger hair. He had a prominent chin, a ruddy complexion and curious catlike green eyes. He wore a dark brown suit, white shirt and plain green tie. Behind him stood a scruffy-looking youth in a leather jacket. Probably his DC, Banks guessed.
“First things first,” said Banks. “What happened to the woman who lives here?”
“Pamela Jeffreys. Know her?”
“What happened to her? Is she still alive?”
“Oh, aye, sir. Just. Someone worked her over a treat. Broken ribs, broken nose, broken fingers. Multiple lacerations, contusions. In fact, multiple just about everything. And it looks as if she broke her leg when she fell. She was in a coma when we found her. First officer on the scene thought she was dead.”
Banks felt a wave of fear and anger surge through his stomach, bringing the bile to his throat. “When did it happen?” he asked.
“We’re not sure, sir. There’s a clock upstairs was smashed at twenty past nine, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. A bit too Agatha Christie, if you ask me. Doc thinks last night, but we’re still interviewing the neighbors.”
“So you think she lay there for nearly twenty-four hours?”
“Could be, sir. The doctor said she’d have bled to death if she hadn’t been a good clotter.”
Banks swallowed. “Raped?”
Waltham shook his head. “Doc says no signs of sexual assault. When we found her she was fully clothed, no signs of interference. Some consolation, eh?”
“Who found her?”
“One of her musician friends got worried when she didn’t show up for rehearsals this morning. Some sort of string quartet or something. Apparently she’d been a bit upset lately. He said she was usually reliable and had never missed a day before. He phoned the house several times during the day and only got her answering machine. After work he drove by and knocked. Still no answer. Then he had a butcher’s through the window. After that, he phoned the local police. He’s in the clear.”
Banks said nothing. DS Waltham leaned against the bannister. The scruffy DC squeezed by them and went upstairs. In the front room, someone laughed out loud again.
Waltham coughed behind his hand. “Er, look, sir, is there something we should know? There’ll have to be questions, of course, but we can be as discreet as anyone if we have to be. What with you showing up here and… ”
“And what, Sergeant?”
“Well, I recognize your voice from her answering machine. It was you, wasn’t it?”
Banks sighed. “Yes, yes it was. But no, there’s nothing you need to be discreet about. There is probably a lot you should know. Shit.” He looked at his watch. Almost seven. “Look, Sergeant, I’d clean forgot I’m supposed to be meeting DI Blackstone for dinner.”
“Our DI Blackstone, sir?”
“Yes. Know him?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Do you think you can get one of the PCs to page him or track him down? It’s the Shabab on Eastgate.”
Waltham smiled. “I know it. Very popular with the lads at Millgarth. I’ll see to it, sir.”
He went to the door and spoke to one of the uniformed constables then came back. “He’s on his way. Look, sir, PC O’Brien there just told me there’s an old geezer across the street thinks he might have seen something. Want to come over?”
“Yes. Very much.” Banks followed him down the path and through the small crowd. One or two reporters shouted for comments, but Waltham just waved them aside. PC O’Brien stood by the low, dark stone wall that ran by the allotments, talking to a painfully thin old man wearing a grubby, collarless shirt. Behind them, other allotment workers stood in a semi-circle, watching, some of them leaning on shovels or rakes. Very Yorkshire Gothic, Banks thought.
“Mr. Judd, sir,” O’Brien said, introducing Waltham, who, in turn, introduced Banks. “He was working his allotment last night just before dark.” Waltham nodded and O’Brien walked off. “Keep those bloody reporters at bay, will you, please, O’Brien?” Waltham called after him.
Banks sat on the wall and took out his cigarettes. He offered them around. Waltham declined, but Mr. Judd accepted one. “Might as well, lad,” he croaked, tapping his chest. “Too late to worry about my health now.”
He did look ill, Banks thought. Sallow flesh hung off the bones of his face above his scrawny neck with its turkey-flaps and puckered skin, like a surgery scar, around his Adam’s apple. The whites of his eyes had a yellow cast, but the dark blue pupils glinted with intelligence. Mr. Judd, Banks decided, was a man whose observations he could trust. He sat by and let Waltham do the questioning.
“What time were you out here?” Waltham asked.
“From seven o’clock till about half past nine,” said Judd. “This time of year I always come out of an evening after tea for a bit of peace, weather permitting. The wife likes to watch telly, but I’ve no patience with it, myself. Nowt but daft buggers acting like daft buggers.” He took a deep draw on the cigarette. Banks noticed him flinch with pain.
“Were you the only one working here?” Waltham asked.
“Aye. T’others had all gone home by then.”
“Can you tell us what you saw?”
“Aye, well it must have been close to knocking-off time. It were getting dark, I remember that. And this car pulled up outside Miss Jeffreys’s house. Dark and shiny, it were. Black.”
“Do you know what make?”
“No, sorry, lad. I wouldn’t know a Mini from an Aston Martin these days, to tell you the truth, especially since we’ve been getting all these foreign cars. It weren’t a big one, though.”
Waltham smiled. “Okay. Go on.”
“Well, two men gets out and walks up the path.”
“What did they look like?”
“Hard to say, really. They were both wearing suits. And one of them was a darkie, but that’s nowt to write home about these days, is it?”
“One of the men was black?”