'When I saw the flasher?'
'Before that.'
'Back to leaving hospital?'
'Yes.'
The nurse looked at him perplexed, like he was an idiot. 'Is it relevant?'
Delaney sighed and looked at her, any sympathy he had for her draining fast. 'I'll tell you what, Ms Manners, let's make a deal. I won't tell you how to dress a wound or change a bedpan, and you let me decide what details are important or not in a particularly brutal murder case.'
'All right, no need to get snitty. I can get that kind of attitude any day of the week, if I want it, from the consultants who think they're better than good God Himself.'
Delaney ignored her. 'What time did you leave work this morning?'
'I left the hospital about eight o'clock.'
'And you always cut through this part of the heath?'
'Yes. It takes me about fifteen minutes to walk home. And a bit of fresh air never hurt anyone. I've learned that much in my job.'
Tell that to the woman in the scene of crime tent, thought Delaney, but didn't say it. 'And you didn't see anything out of the ordinary?'
'I saw a man wagging his penis at me! I'd count that as a pretty unusual event, wouldn't you?'
'Can you describe it?'
'The penis, or the event?'
Delaney sighed and Sally Cartwright and Bob Wilkinson had to try hard not to smile. 'Just tell us what happened?'
'I was walking on to the heath—'
Delaney interrupted her. 'You hadn't seen anybody earlier, somebody coming off the heath perhaps?'
The woman shook her head. 'Not a single soul. Weather like this tends to keep people at home or in their cars, doesn't it?'
Sally looked up from her notebook. 'And the man who exposed himself to you . . . ?'
'He was in his late twenties I'd say, maybe thirties. Semi-priapic.'
'I'm sorry?' Sally asked.
Wilkinson smiled. 'He had a hard-on, Sally.'
'Yeah, thanks, Bob,' said Delaney.
'Well, partly so, enough I guess for him to waggle,' added the nurse. 'It was early, and it was pretty cold, mind you.'
Delaney held up his hand. 'Can we concentrate on the man, not just the member?'
'He was about five ten, wearing a fawn-coloured overcoat, he might have had a suit on under his coat, he had dark trousers anyway.'
Sally flicked back through her notebook. 'You called him a raggedy man earlier.'
Valerie Manners nodded. 'Yes, it was his hair.'
Delaney waited patiently, but when there was nothing forthcoming, said, 'And? What about his hair?'
'It was raggedy, you know?'
'No?'
'Sort of wild, curly. A bit like yours.' She pointed to Delaney. 'Only longer and it hadn't been combed, it was sticking out.'
