'Aye,' he said.
'Not too much damage, I hope,' she said, looking at the back of the cottage which also bore the mark of great heat. The window-frames looked as if they'd been recently replaced and reglazed.
'Enough. Nought that money won't mend. Are you done choosing?'
'I think so. Perhaps another pink one. They are gorgeous. Is it good soil?'
'Soil's what you make it,' he answered. 'Many a barrow-load of manure and many a barrowload of compost I've poured into this soil. See there!'
He pointed to where a broad pit which seemed to be full of decaying vegetable matter was sending coils of vapour into the dank autumn air.
'Hot as a curate's dreams in there,' he averred, watching her closely.
She glanced at him, amused by the odd expression.
'It doesn't look very appetizing,' she said. 'What's in it?'
'Everything,' he said. 'What pigs won't eat yon pit gobbles up. Dustmen get slim pickings from Arthur Lightfoot.'
His sudden enthusiasm made her uneasy and she was glad to hear the rickety gate shut behind her.
'That your car?' asked Lightfoot as she regained the footpath.
'Yes.'
'Ah.'
He didn't offer to say more so she asked, 'Could you tell me the way to a house called The Pines? I've got a vague idea, but I might as well hit it first time.'
'Swithenbank's house?'
That's right.'
'Them dahlias for Mrs Swithenbank?'
'As a matter of fact, they are.'
'She's not fond of dahlias, Mrs Swithenbank,' said Lightfoot. 'She says they're a wormy sort of flower.'
'I'm sorry for it,' said the woman, irritation in her voice now. 'Can you tell me where the house is or not?'
'Second turn left, second house on the left,' said Lightfoot.
'Thank you.'
When she reached the car, he called after her, 'Hey!'
She laid the flowers on the passenger seat before turning.
'Yes?'
'Mrs Swithenbank doesn't like people parking on her lawn either.'
Angrily she got into the car, bumped off the grass strip in front of the war memorial, and accelerated violently away.
Arthur Lightfoot watched her out of sight. Turning to his wheelbarrow, he tossed in a couple of weeds prior to pushing the barrow towards his compost pit and tipping the contents on to its steaming surface.
'Feeding time,' he said. 'Feeding time.'
CHAPTER II
… wake and sigh
And sleep to dream till day
Of the truth that gold can never buy.
Pascoe relaxed in a commodious chintz-covered armchair whose springs emitted distant sighs and clangings like an old ship rolling at its moorings on a still night. He looked, and felt, extremely comfortable, but the watchful eyes were triangulating the man in front of him.
Swithenbank was a slightly built man, almost small, but with an air of control and composure which created a greater sense of presence than another six inches might have done. He had black hair obviously carefully tended by a good barber. Sorry, hair stylist, corrected Pascoe, whose own hairdresser was very much a barber, still more a butcher according to Ellie, his wife. Ellie would also have used Swithenbank's clothes as the occasion of more unflattering comparisons. Pascoe was smart in an off-the-peg chain store kind of way, while there was something about the other man's thin-knit pale blue roll-collar sweater that proclaimed without the need of a label that it was an exclusive Italian design and cost forty-five pounds.
Show me a poor publisher and I'll show you a fool, as Dr Johnson may have, ought to have, said, thought Pascoe, forcing his attention from the exquisitely cut slacks back to the man's features. Broad forehead, long straight nose, thick but neatly trimmed black moustache, small, very white teeth, which glinted beneath the dark brush as the man made ready to speak.
'Let's not beat about the bush, Inspector,' said Swithenbank.
'What bush would that be?' enquired Pascoe politely.
'You said you were here about Kate, my wife. Have you found her?'
'No,' said Pascoe.
'Thank God!'
'I'm sorry?' said Pascoe.
'I thought you were going to tell me you'd found her body.'
'No. Not yet, sir.'
Swithenbank looked at him sharply.
'Not yet. But you sound as if you expect to.'
'I didn't intend to,' said Pascoe.
Suddenly Swithenbank smiled and the atmosphere became much more relaxed, as if he had operated a switch. A man of considerable charm, thought Pascoe. He didn't trust men of considerable charm very much.
'So we're really at square one, no further forward than twelve months ago. You think Kate's dead though you've got no proof. And I, of course, remain Number One suspect.'
'It's a position we unimaginative policemen always reserve for husbands,' replied Pascoe, content to fall in with the new lightness of manner.
'But my ratiocinative powers tell me there must be more, Inspector. Visits from your colleague, Inspector Dove of the Enfield constabulary, I have come to expect. I think he believes, not without cause, that ultimately the threat of his company could bring a man to confess to anything. But I'm sure it takes more than mere suspicion to get a Yorkshire policeman into motion. Am I beating anywhere nearer the bush, Inspector?'
'The bush is burning, but it is not consumed,' said Pascoe with a smile.
'A Biblical policeman!' exclaimed Swithenbank.
'Just carry on with the still small voice,' said Pascoe, beginning to enjoy the game.
'Now you disappoint me,' said Swithenbank. 'Wasn't it Elijah who got the still small voice? While, of course, Moses it was who talked to the trees.'
'Both agents of the truth,' said Pascoe. 'You were saying?'
'It's my guess, then, that something has stimulated your interest in me. A tip of some kind. Phone calls perhaps? Or anonymous letters? Am I right or am I right?'
'You're right,' said Pascoe. 'That's really very sharp of you, sir. Yes, there's been a letter. And, oddly enough, it came to us here in Yorkshire.'
'Why 'oddly'?'
'It's just that it's a year since your wife disappeared and we've had nothing about you before. Except through official channels, I mean. All the usual post-disappearance 'tips' went to your local station at Enfield – or straight to Scotland Yard. We contacted Enfield about this letter, of course.'
'And the omniscient Inspector Dove told you I was presently visiting Wearton!'
'Right,' said Pascoe. 'And as we received the letter and you are in our area… well, here / am.'
'And a pleasant change it makes from your cockney cousins,' said Swithenbank, 'If I may say so.'
'Thank you kindly,' said Pascoe. 'And if I may say, you seem somehow less surprised or taken aback by all
