‘Ben’s not stupid,’ protested MurHn. Then he thought about it. ‘A bit gullible, maybe. You can always tempt him with a lost cause.’
‘It comes of being a lost cause himself.’
Fry watched the Toyota drive away and Morrisscy go into the hotel. She signalled to the car on the opposite side of the road. ‘OK, let’s go.’
Alison Morrissey and Frank Baine were standing in the reception area when Diane Fry and Gavin Murhn entered the hotel. Morrissey looked at them in surprise, then seemed to recognize what they were, if not who they were.
Fry showed them her ID. Morrissey stood her ground, then turned to {jlare at Sergeant Caudwell and PC Nash, who came in close behind. But Frank Baine looked as though he would try to fade into the background o( oak panelling and potted plants and disappear into the corridors of the hotel. It was PC Nash who moved the quickest. He evaded Bainc’s attempt to headbutt him and snapped his handcuffs on to one wrist so that he could control him by the pressure on his arm. Then it was Sergeant Caudwell who read him his rights.
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34
A. week after the snow had arrived, it was still piled on the verges of the A57. Late that afternoon, as Ben Cooper drove towards Harrop in the dusk, he could see the occasional side road that had still not keen properly cleared. On the hillsides were farms or hamlets that the council snowploughs never reached. Farmers had to fight their way down to the road themselves with blades mounted on their tractors. And there would he more snow today — he could feel it in the air.
When he was well ahove the vallcv. Cooper’s headlights caught
./
a blue Vauxhall narked at the side of the road at an awkward angle.
o
As he got nearer, he could see it had skidded into a snowdrift that had hidden a soft verge, now churned to mud. The driver was out of his car, staring at the nearside wheels.
Cooper braked carefully and put his hazard lights on as he drew up in front of the Vauxhall. If Dianc Try had been with him, she would have told him they weren’t a rescue service. If she had recognized who the driver was, she would have said it was no time to be stopping to buy a book. But Cooper turned off the engine, pulled his waterproof from the back seat and climbed out, his feet splashing in the slush. He opened the boot and took out his snow shovel. Some people laughed, but it was essential equipment in the winter. It ought to he standard on cverv police vehicle.
O v 1
It was only when Cooper got out of the Toyota that Lawrence Dalev recognized him. Lawrence didn’t seem glad to see him. and
v O O ‘
he wasn’t dressed for the weather either. He was wearing the same
o
blue jacket he had been wearing in the bookshop, pulled over a thin sweater and shirt. His denims were already wet and stiff below the knee and would take days to dry out. The bookseller was shivering with cold and misery.
‘What’s up then, Lawrence?’
‘I braked a bit too hard,’ he said. ‘My wheels went off the road, and now they just spin round when I rev the engine. I can’t get any grip.’
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He had the resigned air of the motorist for whom a car was a complete mystery once it stopped working. Cooper looked at the mud that had been splattered for several feet over the snow and into the road, and studied the deep ruts the car’s wheels had created for themselves.
‘You’ve dug yourself in a kit,’ he said. ‘Let me get behind and give you a push. But take it easy on the accelerator. Try not to make the wheels spin any more.’
‘I was going to wait for the RAC,’ said Lawrence.
‘Have you called them?’
V
‘I don’t have a mobile. I can’t bear the thought of the radiation frying my brain cells/
Cooper thought it was a bit late to be worrying about that. There was not much more harm that could come to Lawrence’s brain cells than had already been caused by whisky and being surrounded by too many books. Or maybe it was liing alone that had done it. He had let himself be embroiled in something that had been tempting for two reasons the money, of course; but also the feeling that he had been accepted as part of a group, a kind of family.
‘Do you realize the nearest phone box is about tour miles back down the road? You’d have to walk almost to the Snake Inn/
Lawrence shrugged hopelessly. ‘I suppose I would have got round to flagging somebody down/
‘Not everybody stops these days, Lawrence. They’ve heard too many stories of muggings and car-jackings to feel safe about picking up hitchhikers/
Sometimes Cooper could understand Diane Fry’s impatience with people like Lawrence Dalcy. Lawrence had made no attempt at all to flag the Toyota down when he heard it coming, if Cooper hadn’t recognised him, he might well have gone past. Would Lawrence have waved down another vehicle later on? Or would it have been too much of an indignity tor him? Quite possibly he would have remained standing out here and frozen to death first, and become another Marie Tennent.
‘Where were you heading to, anyway?’
‘Oh, just to Glossop. I have a friend there. A fellow bookseller. Since you’ve closed my shop . .
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‘That’s OK. As long as you weren’t thinking of leaving the area.’
