Ruling Passion

'Did he?'

'Yes.'

'Let's find that cat, shall we?'

Ellie took a china ashtray from the mantelpiece and rattled it energetically against the wall. Ten seconds later a sleek ginger shape slid casually from beneath the chair on the arm of which Pascoe was squatting. The animal purred as Ellie picked him up.

'Well done, St Francis. What's the secret?'

'Make a sound like a rattling food-dish and these creatures will come from miles away. Otherwise, if they don't feel like it, you can coax and threaten all night without results.'

'They remind me of you.'

'That'll cost you a steak.'

'See what I mean?'

This slightly unreal, consciously superficial relationship was maintained all the way to the kennels which conveniently turned out to be the ones behind the Jockey at Birkham.

A man was unloading trays of meat and made-up pet food from a blue van as they came out of the office. His van proclaimed that he was Jim Jones, Purveyor of High Class Pet Food.

'Does it make you hungry?' asked Pascoe.

'No. But I am.'

He glanced at his watch. It was just on six-thirty.

'Not too early? Then let's be first in the Jockey. You don't deliver there as well, do you?' he added jocularly to the petfood man who had stood aside to let them past.

He didn't answer, but merely stared unblinkingly at Pascoe and shook his head. Take a joke seriously and you take the wind out of anybody's sails, thought Pascoe, disconcerted. It was one of Dalziel's favourite tricks.

They weren't the first in the pub, but were the first to order their steaks. Ellie drank her lager thirstily, then sat toying with the pebble pendant Pascoe had bought her.

'Peter,' she said, 'when I talked to Dalziel he warned me about putting you on the spot.'

'He did what?'

'You know. He said that I should be careful about sharing information with you as a friend that might possibly cause you difficulties as a policeman. If Colin got in touch with me, for instance, wanting help.'

'Has he?' asked Pascoe flatly, staring into his glass.

'No, he hasn't. But it made me think, what he said. I've been worrying at it ever since. He's wrong, you know. I've just decided that. Fat Dalziel is wrong.'

'Put it in writing,' said Pascoe with a smile.

'Hell, I'm not gone on the complete honesty bit. Some things are better kept quiet. But not for the reasons that Dalziel gave. Not so that you can grow up into a nice fat superintendent like he is.'

'I agree,' said Pascoe. 'That's not at all a good reason for not telling me something. Though I'll want to look more closely at these other things that are better kept quiet.'

'You might be shocked!' she said lightly. 'The real reason I rang you this afternoon was something rather odd. After you dropped me in town I didn't make straight back to college. I had nothing on there and anyway I felt like being among a lot of people after this morning. So I shopped for a couple of hours. Then, about four it must have been, I set off back. I came through Birkham, of course, and stopped to have another wander round the antique shop. But it was shut.'

'Not a very keen trader, our Mr Etherege,' commented Pascoe. 'Who, by the way, has just come into the bar.'

Etherege seemed to be well known and entered immediately into a cheerful exchange of greetings with the landlord and other drinkers.

'Anyway,' said Ellie, 'I was just getting back into the car, when another car pulled up behind me. I thought I recognized it, bright red Citroen. Out jumps Anton Davenant, greets me warmly and says he is just on his way to see me at college.'

'Interesting,' said Pascoe. 'What the hell did he want that he couldn't have got when we met him this morning?'

'I wondered that too. The only thing I could think of was your absence!'

'Flattering. OK. What did he say?'

'I'm not really sure. He seemed to be feeling his way, if you know what I mean. He talked about Colin and the others, particularly Timmy. Evidently he met him when Timmy was working at the Common Market HQ in Brussels and Davenant was doing some kind of gastronomic architectural Grand Tour.'

'Then Timmy comes back and takes up with Carlo again. Interesting.'

'I thought so too. I began to wonder whether he was in fact in the district completely by accident.'

'That,’ said Pascoe, 'is the kind of nasty thought only policemen are supposed to have.'

'Dalziel would be pleased. But I did begin to wonder after a while if Colin might have been in touch with him and he was sounding me out to see whether a policeman's paramour was to be trusted.'

'And was she?'

'Evidently not. He said nothing anyway. He did seem very interested in the book Colin was working on, but I couldn't tell him a thing about that. Perhaps Colin's worried about his manuscript and notes?'

'Wherever Colin is,' said Pascoe unemotionally, 'he'll have a lot more to worry him than the health of his manuscript. So you rang me to chat?'

'That's right. Davenant was still with me, he'd just popped into the loo. I thought you'd like to know.'

Their steaks arrived and with them Etherege. He didn't sit down but stood looking down at them, a gin in one hand and a small bottle of tonic in the other.

'Hello again,' he said with a smile. 'Sorry to interrupt, but I just wondered about those stamps.'

'We haven't been able to have them examined yet, I'm afraid,’ said Pascoe, thinking of poor old Sturgeon, critically ill, perhaps by now even dead.

'Not to worry. No hurry. Pop in and buy the lady another present some time! Cheers.'

He turned and left them.

'Not a bad idea,' said Ellie.

'At his prices?' Pascoe sampled his steak and nodded appreciatively.

'Careful,' warned Ellie. 'Jones the Cat Meats has just come in.'

He glanced at the bar. She was right. The po-faced man had just entered.

Pascoe grinned.

'Well, if they use him here,' he said, 'all I can say is how nice to be one of Mrs Sturgeon's cats!'

Dalziel meanwhile was still in his room, sipping a cup of tea with only half his usual quantity of sugar and unenthusiastically contemplating an evening without potatoes.

The phone rang.

'I'm sorry to have been so long, Superintendent, but there was some urgent business came up.'

'Trouble in the glen?' said Dalziel sourly.

'Aye. Something of that. Now, the man Atkinson at the hotel, he's your man surely, fits the description to a "t".'

'Good. Anything else?'

'Well, no address, I regret to say. They let him put just "London" in the registration book, I’m afraid. I've had a wee word with the manager, and things will be stricter now, I promise you.'

'That makes me very happy.'

'Guid. Guid. Now, Superintendent, he's been there a few times. I have a note of the dates; only for a few days at a time, and not on holiday, it seems. At least he didna act like a man on holiday.'

'How did he act?'

'Like a businessman, they say. And from something the reception lassie heard him say one day, it seems he might be connected with the Nordrill Mining Company.'

'Who the hell are they?'

'Well, if you lived up here, you wouldna need to ask.'

'Sergeant, if you lived down here, you'd bloody well feel the need to answer! Get a move on.'

'Aye. They're one of these companies that are going around everywhere these days, it seems, sinking test shafts to see what's worth ploughing up the earth for. You may have read about them in Wales and the Peak District in England? Well, we have the same trouble.'

'And Atkinson's probably working for them?'

'So it seems.'

'Well done, Lauder,' said Dalziel. 'Just give me those dates and you can get back to the peat fire.'

The phone rang once more before Dalziel could leave. He listened for a long while without offering to interrupt.