"They'm don' live 'ere. What they'm done now?"
"Is there a Mrs. Nelson?"
"No. She passed away, twelve years sin'."
"I'm sorry. So where do Barry and Len live?"
"Abroad. Tenerife."
"How long have they lived there?"
"Bout two year, why?"
"Do they ever come home?"
"Oh, aye, now an' agin."
"When were they last home?"
"Dunno."
"How about six weeks ago?"
"Aye, about then, I suppose."
"And about a month before that?"
"It could o' been."
"What do they do for a living in Tenerife, Mr. Nelson?" I asked.
He switched his gaze to me and clenched his hands together, squeezing and relaxing his fingers, as if milking a cow. "They'm 'ave shares in a bar, or so they'm tells me. Dunno for sure."
"When are you expecting your sons home again?" I said.
He shrugged his shoulders and glanced at his hands and back to me.
"Dunno."
"Do they write or phone to tell you?"
"No, they'm just turn up."
"Without warning?"
"Aye."
"Do you look forward to their visits?"
He didn't answer.
"You had to raise them yourself," I stated.
"I did me best."
"But they gave you a hard time?"
No answer. His fingers were long and swollen at the joints, and one nail was blackened and about to fall off. He wore a wedding ring, but it had been relegated to his pinky because of the swelling. And all the time he squeezed and relaxed his hands, as if the rhythm gave him some comfort.
"Mr. Nelson," I began. "Do you own the rhubarb sheds that back on to the M62?"
The kneading increased in fervour. "Aye," he replied, his head down.
"What do you grow in them?"
"Rhubub," he replied, looking up at me. "I grows rhubub. My boys, Barry and Len, they'm use the other 'un. Don' ask me what they'm grows in it."
"But you've a good idea, haven't you?"
He lowered his head again. "Aye, I suppose so."
"What do you think it is?"
He shrugged his shoulders.
"Pardon."
"Drugs, I reckon."
"So why haven't you reported it to the police?"
He looked at me as if I'd asked him if he ever sniffed when his nose dribbled. "Cos they'd do for me," he replied.
"Are you scared of your sons?" I asked.
He looked at his hands and didn't answer.
"Do they knock you about?"
He mumbled something I didn't catch. "Could you say that again, please," I insisted.
"They've given me a tap, now an' again," he said.
I looked across at Dave. He said: "Put the rest of your clothes on, Mr. Nelson. We have a warrant to search the sheds and we'd like you to come with us."
If only to hold the flippin' dog, I thought.
The other three were scattered around, looking for birds' nests or that long-lost part of the vintage car. As we pulled up they emerged from the greenery and congregated around us. Jeff and the others had arrived home from the fishing trip after midnight, and his eyes resembled the proverbial piss-holes in the snow. In the car Mr. Nelson had explained that he came every day, to feed the dog and fill the generator. There was an automatic irrigation system, so he never had to touch the plants.
The dog leapt about with joy when he unlocked the door, and after a great deal of fussing it settled down with what looked like a dustbin lid full of cows' feet. I measured the length of its chain and added a yard for safety.
"Oh my Gawd!" exclaimed Jeff when he saw the Transit. He pointed at the aerial, the tax disc and the mark on the windscreen.
"Oh my Gawd!" he repeated, then: "It's it. This is it. You jam my so-and-sos."
"Good policing," I told him. "Jammy's nothing to do with it."
"I'll ring for a SOCO," he said, producing a mobile phone.
The plants were in orderly rows, close together and about chest height.
We spread out and walked between them, trailing our fingers through the fronds and all wondering what they were worth and if there was any harm in it. At the far end Dave hammered some new nails through the loose plank so the local youths couldn't steal the evidence. Jeff rejoined us. "He's on his way," he said.
I pulled two leaves from a plant, gave one to Jeff and popped the other in my mouth. "Make you feel better," I told him. Strolling back through the rows I plucked another. At the far end Jeff emerged from the adjacent row and poked his tongue out at me. On it was a chewed-up ball of what might have been spinach. I did the same to him and we both giggled like schoolgirls in an art gallery.
Dave and I took Mr. Nelson back to the station. Some use the Nice Cop and Nasty Cop routine; others rely on the bastinado, beating them on the soles of their feet until they co-operate. We seduce them with a bacon sandwich and a mug of hot sweet tea. After that, he'd have told us anything.
He didn't know when his sons were coming back, but agreed to tell us as soon as they did. If he had the opportunity. The burglaries had coincided with their visits and he had wondered if they had committed them. We assured him they had, and he shed a few tears.
When Jeff and Nigel returned we sat Mr. Nelson in an interview room with another sarni, making a statement to a nice police lady, while we had an operations conference in my office. I wasn't happy about asking him to grass on his sons. Blood, as they say, is thicker than prison soup.
"The alternative," Jeff said, 'is to put out an APW on them and hope someone tells us when they come into the country, or mount an observation operation."
"One's unreliable and the other's expensive," Nigel said.
"We could just watch out for the van moving," Jeff suggested.
"Still expensive," Nigel countered. "We could be waiting weeks. I think we should rely on Mr. Nelson."
"We're asking him to shop his sons," I said. "It doesn't seem fair.
Plus, he might not get the opportunity. Or he might change his mind; he's obviously scared of them."
"Let's ask the technical support boffins to fit the van with a bug,"
Dave suggested.
"Sadly, it belongs to Len," I said. "If it's not Mr. Nelson's van he can't give us permission."
"We could say we didn't know."
"It would be inadmissible," Nigel told him.
"So what? We'll still nab them."
"And it'll get kicked out!"
"We can't fit a bug," I said, 'but there is a way Mr. Nelson could."
They all looked at me.
"He could just happen to drive the van into Electronic Solutions on Monday morning and ask them to fit it with a Tracker," I explained.
"Who would pay?" Nigel asked.
"We would," I replied.
"They cost about two hundred pounds."
Dave turned on him. "If you don't mind me saying so, Nigel," he began, 'you're growing into a right management cop."
"Nigel's right," I said before an argument could develop. "Money's tight, but I'll make a case out for it. Jeff, how much would a surveillance operation cost?"
"God knows!" he gasped.
"Think of a number."
"Er, ten thousand pounds."
"That'll do. Two hundred for a Tracker is a bargain. Have a word with Electronic Solutions in the morning, see if they'll do it cost price.
Or, better still, free. Tell them we'll take our fleet business away from them if they won't. Then ask Mr. Nelson to take the van in."
Electronic Solutions are auto electricians in Halifax. They tune our pursuit cars and fit various gizmos to them. The Tracker is a patented device that is more usually fitted to top-of-the-range vehicles like Porsches and Jags. It is secreted away somewhere and is completely passive until activated by a signal from a tracking station. If the car is reported stolen the signal is transmitted to it, and from then on its movements can be followed to within five yards. According to the literature some owners have had their vehicles found within minutes. Sadly, we're not allowed to plant bugs in vehicles without the consent of the owner. It's regarded as unsporting. Going to court with evidence gathered in such a manner would be misguided and overoptimistic, like ringing the Scottish Assembly and asking to reverse the charges. These days we're not allowed to gain evidence by trickery, subterfuge or deviousness. Confessions are acceptable, most of the time, but not always, and video evidence is good. Courts love video evidence, because TV doesn't lie. Get a decent tape of a crime in progress, show it on Look North, and the villains queue up to shout: