the street door like the shadow he resembles, with the result that the door didn’t swing back with enough momentum to engage the lock and I was able to enter without having to ring any bell but that to his apartment.
He was surprised to see me though he hid it well and courteously invited me in and offered me a drink.
I said coffee to get him into the kitchen.
And as he turned and left me I felt my aura breathe through my flesh, as time began to slow like a goshawk soaring till it attains its motionless apogee.
Through the half-open door I see he is making filter coffee. In my book, casual and probably unwanted visitors merit no more than a spoonful of instant at best. I am flattered and touched by this courtesy.
And in return, I take just as much care with his drink, pouring a carefully judged measure from my little vial into the open whisky bottle standing by the open book and empty glass on his chairside table. No chance of interruption. I am examining his bookshelf when he comes in with the cafetiere.
I see he has brought two mugs. If I were in time, I might have been disconcerted, fearful that by joining me in coffee, he will not take any more whisky till he is in another’s company who might observe his symptoms and make efforts to save him. But out of time, I sit and smile, secure in my certainty that what is written is written, and nothing can change its course.
He pours the coffee, then picks up the bottle, offers to add some to my mug. I hesitate then shake my head. I have work to do, I tell him, work that requires a clear head.
He smiles the smile of a man who does not believe that liquor affects his judgment and, to make his point, adds a good inch of Scotch to his coffee.
Poor doctor. He is right, of course. Drink no longer affects his judgment because it is his affected judgment that makes him drink. Does he yet know where his unhappiness has brought him? Does he realize how unhappy he is? I doubt it, else he might have already sought without my help the quietus I am about to give him.
He drinks his doubly laced coffee with every sign of pleasure. This is well arranged. Two strong tastes to conceal one weak, though strong in everything else.
We talk and drink. He is enjoying himself. He pours more coffee, more Scotch. We drink and talk…and talk… though soon the words that he imagines pearls come rolling misshaped to his lips and stick there, hard to dislodge, yet because all is still so clear in his mind, he thinks this mere inadvertence, too dry a mouth perhaps, easily cured by yet more drink.
He yawns, tries to apologize, looks slightly surprised to find he can’t, clutches his chest, begins to gasp. In time, I would have been surprised. I had looked to see him fall asleep, then I would have taken the cushion his head rests on and used it to send him to a still softer rest. But now I see that I am not called on to do any more, and I am not surprised. He stops gasping, closes his eyes and slumps back in his chair. Soon his breath is so light that it would hardly shake a rose-leaf down. Soon I cannot detect it at all. I place a hair over his lips then pass a few minutes washing my coffee mug and making sure no traces of my presence remain. Finished, I check that the hair has not moved. He has gone. Would that all our goings were so easy. Now I arrange him to be found as he would have wished, at his ease, with his book and his bottle, and steal away softly as if fearful of awaking him. Softly and sadly too.
Yes, this time I am surprised to detect so much of sadness in my joy, a sense of melancholy which remains with me even as I step out into the empty street and feel the tremor of time beneath the pavement once more.
Why so?
Perhaps because he smiled so welcomingly and made me real coffee instead of instant.
Perhaps because here was a man who should have been happy but for whom, as he might have said himself, life became too great a bore…
No, not doubts, not second thoughts.
Just a sense that, no matter how desirable my ultimate destination, this journey might yet take me to places I would rather not visit.
Yes, to be sure, no one said it would be roses all the way. Yes, to be sure, death’s fine, just another turn on the path. But maybe not being born is the very best option, eh?
Talk soon.
25
THE DIALOGUE HAD been found in its usual buff envelope, once more addressed Reference Library, tucked away behind a pile of books reserved for collection on the reception counter close by where the morning mail basket was placed.
Whether it had fallen there by accident or been placed there by design was impossible to say as no one on the staff could assert with absolute certainty that it hadn’t lain there unnoticed since Monday. Even worse, from Dalziel’s point of view, was the fact that the young female librarian who’d found the envelope had excitedly shared her suspicion of its contents with her nearest colleagues and a couple of eavesdropping members of the public before calling the police. Keeping the Fourth Dialogue out of the public domain had been easy with only the Centre security firm who’d handed over the unopened envelope to threaten into silence. But with rumours of the Fifth already starting to circulate, sitting on the Fourth could rapidly turn into a public relations disaster, and Dalziel found himself ordered from above to get his revelation in first. So a statement was put out and a press conference promised for a later date.
Pascoe, after digesting the new Dialogue, saw no reason to change his tack.
“This alters nothing,” he said. “Except maybe now we know why Roote’s been sitting there crying murder. Why pretend it’s anything else when you know the Dialogue admitting all is on its way? Or maybe he thought we’d seen the Dialogue already and were trying to do a bluff on him by ignoring it, and that really got up his nose.”
“But, sir,” said Bowler, “the Wordman describes seeing Roote go in with Dr. Johnson, then he had to wait till Roote came out.”
“Jesus,” said Pascoe in exasperation. “If Roote wrote the Dialogue, that’s exactly what he would say, isn’t it? I mean, he knows we know he was there. You two saw him going off with Johnson on Sunday, we’ve got witnesses who recall seeing them going into the block of flats-but none, incidentally, who recall noticing anyone else unaccounted for hanging around the place-and forensic have picked up traces of him all over the apartment.”
“That it?” said Dalziel.
“And there’s the poem Sam was reading. It took someone pretty familiar with both Beddoes and Sam’s Sheffield background to make sure the book was open at something so appropriate.”
He had told Dalziel about the alleged reasons for Johnson’s move. The Fat Man had yawned. Now Pascoe concentrated his arguments on the potentially more sympathetic ear of Bowler.
“And if we look at the Dialogue, see here, there’s a reference to the poem, this bit about his breath being so light it wouldn’t have shaken a rose-leaf down. That’s almost a direct quote from the first stanza, don’t you see?”
“Yes, sir, I see, sir,” said Bowler. “But…”
“But what?” Doubt from Dalziel was one thing, but from a DC it came close to mutiny!
“But it’s all a bit…convoluted, isn’t it, sir?”
“Convoluted?” echoed Dalziel. “It’s fucking contortuplicated!”
That sounded like a Dalziel original, but Pascoe had been caught out before and made a note to look it up before making comment.
Dalziel went on, “It’s bad enough having this bugger sitting out there, laughing at us, without going looking for trouble. You’ve had Hawkeye here give Roote the once-over already, and I dare say you’re so obsessed with the nasty little sod that you’ve checked him out against every bit of nastiness that’s gone on since he arrived in town. And you’ve not come up with owt, else you’d have him banged up, preferably underground and in shackles. Any other ideas? Anyone?”
Hat took a deep breath and said, “If we’re looking for someone with a strong connection to all the victims, except the first two who seem to be random, well, there’s Charley Penn. And he drives an old banger which would
