touch the ground. With your record, you won’t have a chance. We’ve already placed you at the scene.”
“There were about a hundred other people there, too,” Paul said.
“Count them, did you? I thought you said you weren’t there.”
“I wasn’t.”
“Then how did you know?”
“Read it in the papers.”
“Read? You? I doubt you’d get past the comics.”
“Very funny,” Paul said. “But you can’t prove nothing.”
“You might just be right about that,” Burgess said. “But remember, if I can’t prove nothing, it means I can prove something. And when I do … when I do…”
He left the threat hanging and turned to the room at large. They were all gathered in the house except Rick, who had taken the children to town for new clothes. “The rest of you are just as guilty,” he went on. “When we build a case against dick-head here, you’ll all get done for withholding information and for being accessories. So if any of you know anything, you’d best tell us now. Think about it.”
“We don’t know anything,” Seth said quietly.
“Well, there we are then.” Burgess sighed and ran his free hand through his hair. “Stalemate.”
“And don’t think we won’t complain about the way you’ve treated us and how you hit Paul,” Mara said.
89
“Do it, love. See if I care. Want me to tell you what’ll happen? If you’re lucky, it’ll get passed down the line back to my boss at the Yard. And do you know what? He’s an even bigger bastard than I am. No, your best bet’s to come clean, tell the truth.”
“I told you,” Paul said. “I don’t know anything about it.”
“All right.” Burgess dropped his cigar stub into a teacup balanced on the arm of a chair. The hot ash sizzled as it hit the dregs. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you. Come on, Sergeant. We’ll leave these people to think about it a bit more.
Maybe one of them’ll come to his senses and get in touch with us.”
Hatchley struggled to his feet and joined Burgess by the door. “We’ll be back, don’t worry,” Burgess said. As they walked out of the small porch, he reached up, slapped the wind chimes and snarled, “Bloody tuneless racket.”
Ill
Banks waited, glass of sherry in hand, until the crowd around the buffet had dwindled before he collected his own paper plateful of cold cuts and salad.
“Ee, it’s a bit of all right, this, i’n’t it,” a grey-haired woman in a powder-blue crepe dress was saying to her friend.
“Aye,” the other said. “Better’n old Ida Latham’s do. Nobbut them little sarnies wi’ t’crusts cut off. No bigger’n a postage stamp they weren’t. Cucumber, too.
It allus gives me gas, cucumber does.”
“Chief Inspector Banks?”
The man who suddenly materialized beside Banks was about six-two with a shiny bald head, fuzzy white hair above the ears, and a grey RAF moustache. He wore a black armband over his dark grey suit, and a black tie. Even the rims of his glasses were black. Banks nodded.
“Thought it must be you,” the man went on. “You don’t look like a relation, and I’ve never seen you around here before. Superintendent Gristhorpe sent word you were coming.” He stretched out his hand. “Detective Chief Inspector 90
Blake, Scarborough CID.” Banks managed to balance his sherry glass on his plate and shake hands.
“Pleased to meet you,” he said. “Shame it has to be at something like this.”
They walked over to a quieter and less crowded part of the hall. Banks put down his plate on a table-after all, he couldn’t eat while talking-and took out a cigarette.
“How’s the investigation going?” Blake asked.
“Nothing yet. Too many suspects. Anything could have happened in a situation like that.” He looked around the hall. “Lot of people here. PC Gill must have been a popular bloke.”
“Hmmm. Didn’t know him well, myself. It’s a big station.”
“Keen, though,” Banks said. “Volunteering for overtime on a Friday night. Most of our lads would’ve rather been at the pub.”
“It’s more likely he needed the money. You know how half the bloody country lives on overtime. Has to, the wages we get paid.”
“True. Fond of money, was he?”
Chief Inspector Blake frowned. “Are you digging?”
“We don’t know anything about Gill,” Banks admitted. “He wasn’t one of ours.
Every little bit helps. I’m sure you know that.”
